







Hi ^^^H ■■lb 



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THOUGHTS 



ON THE 



FUTURE CIVIL POLICY 



AMERICA. 



JOHN WILLIAM DRAPER, M.D., LL.D., 

PROFESSOR OF CHEMISTRY AND PHYSIOLOGY IX THE UNIVERSITY OF KKW 

YORK ; 

AUTHOR OF A "TREATISE ON HUMAN PHYSIOLOGY" 

AND OF A 

" HISTORY OF THE INTELLECTUAL DEVELOPMENT OF EUROPE." 



SECOND EDITION. 



NEW YORK: 

HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS, 

FRANKLIN SQUARE. 

180 6. 



x^ 



1 



\ 



Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year one thousand eight 
hundred and sixty-five, by 

HARPEE & BROTHER S, 

In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the Southern District of 

New York. 



Shortly will be published, by the same Author, 
A HISTORY OF THE AMERICAN CIVIL WAR. 

Three Volumes, 8 v o. 



PREFACE. 



In" a work on " The Intellectual Development of Europe," 
published in 1863, 1 showed that the historical progress of 
the nations of that continent illustrates the fact that social 
advancement is as completely under the control of natural 
law as is the bodily growth of an individual. 

It was my intention in that work to limit the application 
of the principles employed to the case of Europe, but it is 
plain that they may equally be made to apply to the case 
of America. 

Last winter, at the request of the New York Historical So- 
ciety, I gave a course of four lectures for the purpose of 
showing that application. 

The favor with which my work on Europe had been re- 
ceived, a great many editions, reprints and translations, of it 
having been called for in a short time, was again exhibited 
in the case of these lectures, and I became satisfied that it 
was desirable to give them a more permanent form. 

Selecting, therefore, some of the more prominent princi- 
ples thus presented, I design to show in this work their bear- 
ing on certain questions of great political interest in Amer- 
ica. The lectures delivered before the Historical Society 
are here, of course, very much extended, the amount of mat- 
ter having been almost quadrupled, and many new topics in- 
troduced. 



iy PREFACE. 

Perhaps at the present moment, when the Eepublic has 
reached one of those epochs at which it must experience im- 
portant transformations, it may not be inopportune to direct 
attention to the effects of physical agents and laws on the 
advancement of nations. We are too prone to depreciate 
their influence. 

The aim of all science is prevision — the foretelling of the 
future. Historical foresight is not denied to man. As the 
Astronomer, from recorded facts, deduces the laws under 
which the celestial bodies move, and then applies them with 
unerring certainty to the prophesying of future events, so 
may the Historian, who relies on the immutability of Nature, 
predict the inevitable course through which a nation must 
pass. 

To appreciate the working of some of those natural laws 
in the case of America, to divine the future tendencies of the 
Eepublic, to extract from the observations we make rules for 
national conduct — these are the objects to which the follow- 
ing pages are devoted. 

New York, 1865. 



PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION. 

A very large edition of this work has been exhausted in 
the course of a few weeks, and a second one is called for. 
For this mark of public approval I return my sincere thanks. 

In this edition I have not thought it desirable or necessary 
to make any changes, except a few typographical corrections. 

New York, October, 18G5. 



CONTENTS, 



CHAPTER I. 

ON THE INFLUENCE OP CLIMATE. 

Commencing with the statement that Nations, like all the forms 
of life, are transitory, the physical influences that originate 
and destroy those forms are considered. And since plants 
and animals are found to change helplessly under such in- 
fluences, they are therefore illustrations of the control of 
Universal Law. A special inquiry is made as to the effects 
of Climate on the skin and skidl of man, and on his phys- 
ical and intellectual powers. 

Then folloios a brief topographical descriptio7i of the United 
States ; the Climate effects, North and South, are considered, 
and the conditions ?iecessary to insure stability in the polit- 
ical institutions of the country are pointed out. The general 
inferences are illustrated by historical cases, as those of Egypt 
and Asia. 

The main conclusion brought into relief is, that personal lo- 
comotion can check the effects of Climate. The importance 
of that locomotion in the development of the American Re- 
public, and the necessity of legislation to encourage and se- 
cure it, are insisted upon Page 9 

CHAPTER II. 

ON THE EFFECTS OF EMIGRATION. 

Admitting the correctness of the division of Society into three 
grades, as established by Machiavelli, the effect arising from 
the emigration of each of those grades is considered, and il- 
lustrations from the history of Spain and England examined. 
TJie extinction of the Romans and diffusion of the Arabs are 
traced to their physiological causes. 



Vi CONTENTS. 

The political consequences of immigration are illustrated by the 
establishment of the Cotton manufacture in Europe and Negro 
slavery in America. 

The ante -historic settlement of Europe by immigrants from 
Asia, as determined by the modern methods of linguistic re- 
search, is next considered, the laws of Population explained 
in connection therewith, and the necessity of material to mor- 
al changes suggested. 

MachiavelWs principles and the foregoing results are then ap- 
plied to the United States — 1st. European immigration in the 
North / 2d. Internal emigration to the West ; 3d. Prospective 
emigration to the South ; 4th. Asiatic immigration to the Pa- 
cific States. The evils contingent on the spread of Polygamy, 
and the general effects of all these movements on the ivealth 
and grandeur of the Republic, are shown .... Page 93 

CHAPTER III. 

ON THE POLITICAL FOKCE OF IDEAS. 

Ideas act on masses of men in a double manner, sometimes ex- 
erti?ig an impelling, sometimes a resisting agency. 

The Impelling power of Ideas is illustrated in the case of Mo- 
hammedanism, of which the political development as attained 
in Spain, and the Intellectual, as ?nanifested in the philoso- 
phy of Averroes, are described. 

The Resisting pouier of Ideas is illustrated in the case of the 
Jeics. A brief sketch is given of their history, their sacred 
writings, and the modifications impressed upon them by the 
Persians, Greeks, and Arabs. It is their Messianic idea that 
resists the influences of Conquest and Time, and preserves them 
a separate people among all nations. 

Man may comprehend Nature and subjugate physical forces. 
Under this Idea modem civilization is advancing. It is il- 
lustrated by a sketch of certain scientific discoveries and use- 
ful inventions. 

The ecclesiastical causes of the European opposition to Science 
are explained, and the duty of America to develop and protect 
free thought is enforced 178 



CONTENTS, yii 

CHAPTER IV. 

ON THE NATURAL COURSE OF NATIONAL DEVELOPMENT. 

The Organization, Development, and Government of the Nat- 
ural World are shown to involve a continual tendency to con- 
centration of power, and the conferring of a dominant control 
on Intelligence. 

This principle applies in the case of human societies during their 
political development. A comparison is instituted between the 
European method of government through the 31 orals, and the 
American of government through the Intellect. It is illus- 
trated by the history of England, taken as a type of the for- 
mer, and by the history of the United States, taken as a type 
of the latter. 

It follows, from the Intellectual method adopted, that America 
must be the scene of a future conflict of Ideas. Their ac- 
tion, reaction, and modifications are alluded to, and the scien- 
tific tendency to unity of opinion pointed out. 

And, finally, the analogies between the Italian ecclesiastical sys- 
tem and the American civil system are referred to. 

The general object of the chapter is to show that in all durable 
human associations there is a natural, an inevitable tendency 
to the concentration ofpoioer; and that, so far from this be- 
ing in antagonism to democratical institutions, it is their le- 
gitimate and unavoidable residt Page 238 



THOUGHTS 

ON 

AMERICAN CIVIL POLICY- 



INTKODUCTIOK 



At the close of the Civil War, which has ended in 
the military vindication of the Great Republic, the 
minds of thoughtful men naturally turn to the Fu- 
ture. An Imperial power has come into existence 
before our eyes. It rivals — perhaps, indeed, it al- 
ready excels — in warlike resources the ancient mon- 
archies of Europe. There is before it a career of un- 
paralleled grandeur, a splendid history, to be wrought 
out on a greater scale than that of Rome. 

What topics, then, are more worthy of public at- 
tention than those with which American statesman- 
ship will now necessarily be called upon to deal? 
With what else can the American reader, who has 
faith in the Destiny of his Nation, more profitably 
occupy himself? There are political problems of sur- 
passing importance, for which solutions must now be 
found. 



10 INTRODUCTION. 

Having "been occupied for many years in the study 
of the Intellectual Development of Europe, I have 
had occasion to observe the manner in which many 
of these problems have been solved on that continent. 
There are principles specially applicable to each na- 
tion, which guide it in its determinations, and settle 
the course of its life. 

Some of these principles I propose now to point 
out, selecting from many topics the four following : 

Influence of Climate, 

Effects of Emigration, 

Political Force of Ideas, 

Natural Course of National Development, 
and making these serve as a framework for the con- 
venient presentation of those principles. 



CHAPTER L 

ON THE INFLUENCE OF CLIMATE. 

Commenting with the statement that Nations, like all the forms 
of W e -> are transitory, the physical influences that originate 
and destroy those forms are considered. And since plants 
and animals are found to change helplessly under such in- 
fluences, they are therefore illustrations of the control of 
Univeesal Law. A special inquiry is made as to the effects 
of Climate on the skin and skull of man, and on his phys- 
ical and intellectual powers. 

Then follows a brief topographical description of the United 
States ; the Climate effects, North and South, are considered, 
and the conditions necessary to insure stability in the polit- 
ical institutions of the country are pointed out. The general 
inferences are illustrated by historical cases, as those of Egypt 
and Asia. 

Tlie main conclusion brought into relief is, that peesojStal lo- 
comotion can check the effects of Climate. The importance 
of that locomotion in the development of the American Re- 
public, and the necessity of legislation to encourage and se- 
cure it, are insisted upon. 

Nations, like individual men, are torn and die — 
an unpalatable truth, for each tries to hide from it- 
self the contemplation of its final day. Each also 
amuses itself with the delusion that, whatever may 
be the hapless lot of others, there is an immortal fu- 
ture in store for it. But what does the inexorable 
hand of History write ? Rome, Macedon, Persia, As- 
syria, Egypt, all are gone. 



12 TRANSITORY CHARACTER OF NATIONS. 

The waves of the ocean spring up, we know not 
where or why. They come careering past us, the very 
emblems of resistless power. They subside and are 
lost among other succeeding waves. In like manner, 
on the vast sea of human life, Empires mysteriously 
emerge. They raise their ephemeral forms conspicu- 
ously high, overwhelming whatever stands in the 
way of their march. They also subside and are lost, 
but the unfathomed abyss of humanity still remains. 

To the infinite expanse of the ocean belongs end- 
less duration. Its waves are only temporary. The 
forces that have impelled them into existence are 
soon expended; an inevitable disappearance awaits 
them. The material of which they are composed 
may be eternal, but they themselves are only vanish- 
ing foirns. 

Vanishing forms ! Such, too, are Nations emerging 
from the mass of humanity. 

Then it might seem to be of trifling moment to 
concern ourselves with the study of any one of them. 
And so indeed it is, if we rise to the most elevated 
point of view that history can occupy. No isolated 
fact is of any intrinsic value in itself. It is its con- 
nection with other facts that gives it all its worth. 
No sound, whatever its quality may be, can ever of 
itself yield music; that arises from the well-ordered 
sequence of sounds. We only become conscious of 
historical harmony through a presentment of success- 



ANALOGY BETWEEN INDIVIDUALS AND NATIONS. 13 

ive nations, varying in their form, their strength, their 
duration. 

With what a solemn emphasis does the Past im- 
press upon us its monition that national life is thus, 
in the necessity of circumstances, transitory ! How 
vain it is to close our eyes to the portentous lesson, 
to refuse to read what is written in the Book of Des- 
tiny ! How vain to try to persuade ourselves that, 
though all other things in the world are disappear- 
ing, we are to be immortal ! Permanence may belong 
to humanity, but not to those forms into which, here 
and there at intervals, humanity has been forced. A 
succession of Nations is the consequence of the life 
of the race, being manifestations of the varying acn 
tivity of groups of men. Life is the active, existence 
the passive state. Life is evanescent, existence is en- 
during. 

Such groups of men, thus with an inevitable fate 
before them, may well desire, as does the individual 
man, to postpone as long as possible their end. They 
may legitimately seek to enjoy their existence while 
it lasts — nay, more, to make it memorable. 

The analogy between the life of an Individual and 
of a Nation arises from a similarity in their constitu- 
tion. In the individual there must be unceasing 
changes in the component parts. The appearance of 
permanence is altogether an illusion. Physicians 
sometimes say that the body changes completely in 



14 CHANGES IN INDIVIDUALS. 

seven years. In truth, it changes far more quickly 
than that. The particles of which it is composed are 
continually becoming effete. They must "be removed, 
and new ones introduced in their stead. Such re- 
placements are going on from the moment of birth to 
that of death ; they occur by night as well as by day; 
during sleep as well as when we are awake. This 
death of the constituent particles of a living being is 
called interstitial death. It is the very condition of 
life. It occurs in every part indifferently — in the 
soft textures, as in the muscles or nerves; in the hard- 
est, as bone. 

Energy of life depends altogether on the rapidity 
of these transmutations. No motion can be accom- 
plished without the wasting away of substance. The 
foot can not take a step, the finger can not be lifted, 
the brain can not execute any intellectual act, with- 
out the death of a portion of its material. As such 
actions are more vigorous, the losses are greater. If, 
then, the body is to be maintained in an unimpaired 
condition, operations of renovation must needs be re- 
sorted to. On the removal of a particle that is dead, 
a new one must be ready to take its place. With 
rapidity and precision the process of transmutation 
goes on, and in a very short time a completely reno- 
vated structure, identical in form, but changed as to 
its constituents, is produced. 

It is surprising on what an enormous scale these 



CHANGES IN NATIONS. 15 

transmutations are carried forward. An adult man, 
weighing not more than 140 pounds, requires to be 
supplied with nearly a ton and a half of material in 
the form of food, water, and air, in the course of every 
year, the larger portion of it being consumed in ac- 
complishing these replacements. In the same period, 
the same weight, that is, a ton and a half of material, 
is dismissed from his system as dead or effete. The 
aspect of identity he presents is therefore altogether 
illusory. Particles are perpetually abandoning him, 
and new particles are being perpetually introduced. 
In a waterfall which retains its appearance for many 
years unchanged, the supply from above continually 
flows in, and the precipitated portions below glide 
finally and forever away. The waste is compensated 
by the supply. In no other manner can the transi- 
tory matter exhibit a permanent form. The waterfall 
is only a form which the flux of liquid assumes. 

So in that collection of substance constituting man, 
or any animal, whatever may be its position, high or 
low, in the realm of life, there is a perpetual intro- 
duction of new material and a perpetual departure 
of the old. 

And so, too, with Nations ; they undergo unceasing 
change. The death of an individual in them corre- 
sponds to the death of a particle in the Individual. 
In the space of thirty or forty years — the period of a 
generation, as it is often called — a complete replace- 



16 PROGRESS OF NATIONS. 

merit has occurred. The men who were active have 
all been removed; succeeding men have occupied their 
places. If there has been a season of violent national 
exertion, such as of war, the substitution has gone on 
with greater rapidity. And yet, notwithstanding all 
this change, the nation may still exist with all its es- 
sential lineaments unimpaired. Like the man or the 
waterfall, it is only a transitory form. 

Nor does the analogy between an Individual and 
a Nation end here. A similar, perhaps a more sur- 
prising parallelism is perceived when their modes of 
growth are considered, for not alone in the incidents 
of birth and death are they alike. As the former 
pursues his way through the successive stages of in- 
fancy, childhood, youth, maturity, old age, so, as his- 
tory teaches, does the latter too. The Individual 
helplessly and in a predestined manner runs through 
these stages, being unable to modify their succession, 
or to accelerate or retard their occurrence. The Na- 
tion, also, in a like helpless and predetermined way, 
moves through the same inevitable career. An un- 
avoidable destiny rules over the progress of both. 

That transitory permanence, if such a contradictory 
expression may be used, which is equally seen in the 
Nation, the Individual, the Waterfall, depends on the 
invariability of external conditions. If they change, 
it also changes, and a new form is the result. In the 
waterfall, if the jutting ledge over which the waters 



RELATIONS OF MATTER AND FORCE. 17 

rusli should break suddenly away, or if some new 
obstacle interfere, the figure of the flowing sheet of 
liquid will be remodeled. 

I repeat with emphasis the significant remark, that 
if external circumstances change, the transitory form 
will change with them; for it leads us by a ready step 
to the subject to which many of these pages are now 
to be devoted — the Influence of Climate on Man. To 
this I therefore hasten, premising, however, some pre- 
liminary thoughts and facts needful for its clear ap- 
preciation. 

A rain-drop descends from the clouds : that simple 
phenomenon, like a thousand others we might consid- 
er, teaches us that there are two existences with which 
all exact science has to deal. They are Matter and 
Force. The substance of which the rain-drop consists 
might, if we chose, occupy our attention. We might 
dwell upon the nature, the properties, the constitution 
of water. And then, again, we might consider what 
is that power through the influence of which the drop 
has come down from the clouds, descending to the 
earth. Our books of Natural Philosophy teach us to 
call it gravitation : they speak of it as a Force. We 
see, therefore, the truth of the remark, that there are 
two things before us, Matter and Force. 

Whence came that matter, that drop of water? 
Chemistry tells us that it was vaporized by the 
warmth of the sun from the ocean, perhaps many 

B 



-Lg VICISSITUDES OF MATTER. 

thousands of miles away. As an invisible steam it 
ascended through, the air. Borne along by drifting 
winds, it came at length to a space where the atmos- 
phere happened to be cooler, and, here condensing, 
lost the invisible and took on the visible form. Now 
it had become a portion of a cloud, ready to reflect 
the glories of the departing day. As a rain-drop it 
then fell to the ground, soaking through the earthy 
strata, to issue forth again in a gushing spring or 
fountain. In company with many others like itself, 
constituting a flowing rill that emptied into larger 
streams, it found through some river a return to the 
sea from which it came. After its many mutations, 
after all the vicissitudes it had undergone, an inevita- 
ble destiny awaited it — restoration to its original 
source. 

So with the power that gently evaporated it from 
the sea, the power that in the winds drifted it from 
climate to climate, the power that made it fall to the 
ground, that carried it down the gently flowing cur- 
rent back to its native place, there was no deteriora- 
tion, no decay. It might have assumed one form after 
another — motion, heat, and the like — but in its intrin- 
sic nature it was altogether indestructible. It is the 
glory of modern science to have proved that Matter 
and Force are both imperishable. 

For matter, see from the illustration here presented 
how, though it may pass from form to form, in what 



VICISSITUDES OF FOKCE. 19 

a returning circle it runs. For force it is the same. 
With predestined certainty both come back to their 
starting-point. 

In the month of March the Sun crosses the Equa- 
tor, dispensing his rays more abundantly over our 
northern hemisphere. Following in his train, a wave 
of verdure advances toward the pole. Trees, awaking 
from winter, assume their leafy ornaments. The veg- 
etable world enters on a new period of growth. As 
autumn comes on, this orderly advance of light and 
life is followed by an orderly retreat, and in its turn 
the other hemisphere, the southern, presents the same 
beautiful appearance. 

Whence came all these green leaves and tinted 
flowers, these seeds that are to furnish food for man ? 
Not from the ground, as some persons think. The 
Omnipotent Sun, that central governor of our planet- 
ary system, obtains and condenses the needful mate- 
rial from the air. Under his genial influences a re- 
fined chemical operation is going on. He extracts 
from an invisible and noxious gas — the same that is 
expired from our lungs in the act of breathing, as use- 
less and even poisonous to the system — that plastic 
material out of which the unnumbered beautiful plant- 
organs are composed. Plants are therefore nothing 
more than condensations from the Air, their parts be- 
ing held together by Force that has been derived 
from the Sun — force that, as it were, is imprisoned in 



20 ORIGIN OF ANIMALS. 

them, but ever ready to re-appear. Each year, in this 
manner, through that arch-chemic influence, a store of 
Matter and of Force is laid up, as we are now to see, 
for the animal world. 

For, directly or indirectly, all animals find their nu- 
trition in feeding on plants. Even for those called 
carnivorous, or flesh -feeders, the remark holds good. 
They feed on others that have fed on plants. The 
muscles, and fat, and nerve substance, nay, the very 
bone, all have come from the vegetable world. 

Wherein is the imperious necessity that food thus 
composed and thus obtained should be used by man 
and other animals ? It is for the double purpose of 
securing Matter and Force. The former, in being con- 
sumed, furnishes the latter. 

We have already seen that an animal is only a 
transitory form, through which material substance is 
visibly passing. A scientific examination of its life 
must include two primary facts. It must consider 
whence and in what manner the stream of material 
substance has been derived, and whither it passes 
away. And since Force can not be created from 
nothing, and is in its very nature indestructible, it 
must determine from what source that which is dis- 
played by animals has been obtained, in what man- 
ner it is employed, and what disposal is made of it 
eventually. The Force comes from the Sun, the Mat- 
ter from the Air. 



RELATION OF THE PLANT AND ANIMAL WORLDS. 21 

But how does all this wasted material, that has 
subserved its offices iu animals, escape from them? 
To so great an extent by the breath, that, with cer- 
tain exceptions needless to notice here, it may be said 
that the breathing of animals is essential to the grow- 
ing of plants. We cast out into the atmosphere those 
inert products no longer useful to life. Plants then 
appropriate them under the influence of the Sun, and 
organize them again. And this brings us back to the 
same truth that was revealed to us by the drop of 
water. There is a cycle or revolution through w r hich 
material particles suitable for organization incessantly 
run. At one moment they exist as inorganic combi- 
nations in the air or the soil, then as portions of 
plants, then as portions of animals, then they return 
to the air or the soil, once more to renew their cycle 
of movement. The metamorphoses feigned by the 
poets of antiquity have hence a foundation in fact; 
and the Vegetable and Animal, the organic and inor- 
ganic worlds, are indissolubly bound together. Plants 
form, animals destroy. 

In this relation of the Plant and Animal worlds to 
each other, there is a condition too important to be 
overlooked. It is their mutual interbalancing. The 
sum total of the one must be exactly adjusted to that 
of the other. If either were permitted to acquire a 
superiority, it would impress upon the atmosphere 
a specific change. If animal life predominated, the 



22 CONTROLLING LAW. 

quantity of carbonic acid would preponderate; if 
plant life, the quantity of oxygen. Now there is evi- 
dence the most copious, the most satisfactory, that for 
many thousands of years the relative quantity of 
these ingredients has remained unchanged. The at- 
mosphere is to-day the same in composition that it 
was sixty centuries ago. 

There must therefore have been during that long 
lapse of time a rigorous adjustment of the two forms 
of life to one another, neither being permitted to gain 
a superiority, but each minutely and exactly balanced 
to the other. I will not at present enter on a descrip- 
tion of the simple manner in which this equipoise is 
accomplished, but will be content with the emphatic 
remark, that in the most conspicuous manner it indi- 
cates THE EXISTENCE OF CONTROLLING Law. 

The material which has flowed through the heart 
of man as blood, is transferred by breathing to the 
ail', and aids in the formation of forest-trees and flow- 
ers. The Asiatics, with whom have originated all the 
varieties of religious creeds that have spread to any 
extent in the world, not unfrequently asserted a trans- 
migration of souls. They would have been much 
nearer the truth had they believed in a transmigra- 
tion of bodies. The coal that we burn is the remains 
of forests which in former ages were thronged with 
living things — forests that sprang, as do the trees 
with us, from gases that were formed by the resj)ira- 



NATURE OF THE AIR. 23 

tion of animals, but of animals that are now all ex- 
tinct. 

Atmospheric air is then the grand receptacle from 
which all living things come, and to which they all 
return. It is the cradle of vegetable, the coffin of 
animal life. Made up as it is of atoms that have 
once lived, that have run through innumerable cycles 
of change, the aspect of purity it presents conceals too 
well its history. In its ethereal expanse are crowds 
of particles that have once blossomed as flowers, or 
participated in the pleasures and pains of animal life. 
Their former function discharged, they await their 
turn of re-organization, occupying themselves in trans- 
mitting the many-colored beams of light, or moving in 
vibration to musical sounds. A condition so tran- 
quil suits well their former state and future destiny. 
In this general tomb the remains of wild beasts and 
of more ferocious men disappear, until the solar beams 
recall them to life and give them form again. 

The daily rotation of the Earth on her axis determ- 
ines periodic observances in the functions of organ- 
ized beings, and fixes their times of activity and sleep. 
A similar result attends her yearly motion in her or- 
bit. In our latitudes trees and plants awake at the 
coining of spring, and put forth their leaves and flow- 
ers, and then sink again into their annual slumber. 
Wild birds and beasts conform their habits to the 
progress of the seasons, at one time preparing to bring 



24 INFLUENCE OF THE SEASONS. 

forth their young, at another anticipating with a prov- 
ident foresight the coming winter. It is thus with 
those nocks of pigeons which in countless myriads 
seek the North in spring and return to the South in 
autumn ; thus, also, with the vast herds of buffaloes 
in the West. The migrations of fishes that take place 
at given seasons, and which are connected with the 
well-being and wealth of nations, are determined by 
the occurrence of astronomical epochs. It is no ex- 
planation of these curious facts to say that they de- 
pend on other facts like themselves — that an animal 
sleeps by night because his prey is also asleep — that 
a fish migrates at those periods when his instincts tell 
him that the food on which he lives is abundant. If 
in any of these cases we pass from fact to fact, we uni- 
formly come at last to the conclusion that all these in- 
cidents are under the control of astronomical events ; 
that the Sun not only determines periods of awaken- 
ing and sleep, of growth and decay, but that he con- 
trols and regulates the movements of animated beings 
all over the face of the Earth. His rays, falling per- 
pendicularly, produce the luxuriant vegetation of tro- 
pical regions, and debilitate and enervate the human 
race. In the polar regions their obliquity suffers the 
ground to be always covered with snow, and makes 
those inhospitable countries almost without inhabit- 
ants. The trade winds also, blowing uninterruptedly 
for ages, carry toward the poles immense quantities of 



INFLUENCE OF THE OCEAN. 25 

oxygen gas, which the green parts of plants throw into 
the atmosphere of the torrid zone. That oxygen is 
evolved by light and then disseminated by heat. In 
the sea the same influence which thus presides in the 
air is also at work. The Gulf Stream, issuing from 
the Mexican waters, with its temperature elevated by 
solar action, determines the distribution of the Atlan- 
tic fishes: the Northern whale avoids its offensive 
warmth, and on its sides shoals congregate Avhich de- 
light in a more genial heat. As it approaches the 
coasts of Europe, and spreads out into a fan-like form, 
the vapors that rise from it give forth their latent 
heat to the air, and moderate the climates of England 
and France. The coldness and sterility of correspond- 
ing latitudes in America are there replaced by a bet- 
ter temperature ; and agriculture, the arts of life, sci- 
ence, and literature, have there reached their greatest 
perfection. This physical agent, thus eternally but in- 
visibly continuing its operation, produces a thousand 
events in which its agency is only remotely traced; 
nor are those influences limited to mere physical re- 
sults ; they stand in connection with the progress of 
society and the evolution of mind. A full develop- 
ment of the reasoning faculty can only take place 
where physical circumstances conspire. Without the 
Gulf Stream, Newton would never have written his 
Principia, nor Milton Paradise Lost. 

In these events, which strike us forcibly when we 



26 INFLUENCE OF THE SUN. 

thus trace them step by step from their origin to their 
results, we are prone, at a casual glance, to give too 
much weight to intervening influences, and forget 
the final cause. We may assert that, with returning 
seasons, periods of vegetation, and the distribution 
of plants and animals, astronomical occurrences like- 
wise direct a thousand of those daily movements 
taking place in every part of the world. There is no 
gathered harvest, no desolating famine, that has not 
sprung from an immediate connection with them. In 
judging from a narrow circle of observation or from 
an imperfect experience, men are led to regard these 
as fortuitous affairs. In truth, they are brought about 
by unfailing and unchangeable causes. The breeze 
that for a little time distends a passing sail — the 
glimpse of light, which, issuing through some break 
in the clouds, for a moment shines upon it, were pre- 
ordained from the beginning of things — they came in 
the resistless necessities of the case. If they had not 
occurred, the order of Nature had that instant ended. 
From century to century the Sun pours forth his un- 
diminished stores of light and heat ; the former out 
of inorganic material constructing molecules that are 
organized, and with them composing the myriads of 
vegetables destined to support animal life ; the latter 
controlling the movements of inorganic things, divid- 
ing into climates the earth's surface, volatilizing wa- 
ter from the sea, setting the wind in motion, and di- 



UNIFORMITY OF PHYSICAL ACTION. 27 

recting the form, duration, and movement of the 
clouds. The primitive force at work producing 
these vital and meteorological phenomena under- 
goes no variation in intensity from year to year. 
It is therefore expended in producing the same 
amount of effect. For this reason, the droughts of 
one country are contemporaneous with the abundant 
showers of another ; the famine threatening one place 
is compensated by harvests in another. As natural 
laws were never meant for individuals, but for uni- 
versal action on systems and masses, we must take 
care that we are not misled in our interpretation of 
these incidental vicissitudes. Operating with unerr- 
ing certainty and with unvarying force, the Sun car- 
ries on his plastic work, as the Earth in her daily 
rotations submits herself to his beams. From this it 
comes to pass that, though there may be variations 
in the lot of particular individuals or of particular 
nations, the common interests of all are protected, 
the common rights of all upheld. From the very 
beginning of things every class of variation has been 
determined — where particular climates shall fall, 
where particular temperatures shall be observed, 
what shall be the speed of vegetable growth, what 
tribe of animals shall be given — and the result re- 
mains fixed and invariable. 

If we consider the successive races of organized 
beings, beginning from the lowest and passing to 



28 CONTROL OVER PLANTS AND ANIMALS. 

the higher tribes, it would seem as if the gener- 
al idea under which Nature is acting is, as the 
more complex structures are evolved, to emancipate 
them from the direct control of external physical 
forces. The Vegetable Kingdom, unendued with lo- 
comotive powers, deriving its existence directly from 
external agents, is completely under their control. 
If the summer is too brilliant, or rains do not fall, a 
plant withers and dies. In the same manner, the 
lower races of animals have their existence determ- 
ined by the action of physical causes : if these be 
favorable, they nourish; if unfavorable, they must 
submit to an inevitable lot. To tribes that are high- 
er, to a certain extent the rigor of these laws is re- 
mitted, and a certain amount of independence allow- 
ed. The Lion can retire to a shade in the middle 
of the day ; yet still he is held in a state of subjec- 
tion, and instinctively submits to the operation of 
an overruling power, and is kept to the sands of his 
desert, from cool and temperate climates. The sun- 
beam is his chain. In man alone the emancipation 
is complete, for nature has committed a control of 
her forces to him. It matters not whether he be in 
the torrid zone or the frigid, he can temper the sea- 
sons by resorting to artifices of clothing or by the 
management of fire. He also can dissipate the dark- 
ness of night by artificial light, prolonging for many 
hours each day his active existence, and increasing 



CONTROL OVER MAX. 29 

his social enjoyments. Developed by civilization, he 
is no more a prey to the accidents of the seasons. If 
the harvests in his own country have failed him, he 
has created commerce, which brings him an abun- 
dance from distant places. Unlike inferior tribes, 
which instinctively aim at the result he so perfectly 
accomplishes, he does not wait upon Nature, but 
compels her to minister to him. Oppressed by hun- 
ger, fishes migrate in the sea, and innumerable flocks 
of birds direct their flight through the air ; but civil- 
ized man, without calling into action his own locomo- 
tive powers, puts his arm across the globe and satis- 
fies his wants. 

But, though thus seemingly the master, man is re- 
ally the dependant of physical agencies. The devel- 
opment of his intellect, which gives him a control 
over them, is, in truth, determined by them. To be 
satisfied of this, we have only to compare the effect 
of climates in the torrid, temperate, and frigid zones. 
We might appeal to individual experience as to the 
enervating effect of hot climates, or to common ob- 
servation as to the great influence exercised by at- 
mospheric changes, not only on our intellectual pow- 
ers, but even on our bodily well-being. It is within 
a narrow range of latitude that great men have been 
born. In the earth's southern hemisphere not one 
as yet has appeared. 

Not without reason have I in the foregoing pages 



30 SLOW CHANGES IN THE AIR. 

dwelt 112)011 the control that physical conditions ex- 
ert over living beings, irrespective of their position 
in the scale of nature. For it necessarily follows 
that, should any thing transpire to impress a change 
on those physical conditions, a reflected effect must 
instantly be perceived in the organic forms. They 
must change too. Now the knowledge we have ac- 
quired of the past history of the earth instructs us 
that her surface has passed through many modifica- 
tions, and that her physical condition has altered in 
the slow course of thne. Her geographical aspect 
has undergone many mutations ; there are continents 
where the sea once was, there are oceans where there 
was dry land. In a remote antiquity, the composi- 
tion of the atmosphere was not the same as it is 
now ; it contained more carbonic acid, less oxygen 
gas. The enormous quantities of coal, myriads of 
tons in weight, now enveloped in the solid strata, 
once existed in the air. Separated therefrom by the 
action of the solar rays, the atmospheric pressure 
necessarily became less. For sixty centuries, as I 
have already remarked, no appreciable change of 
this kind has occurred ; and hence it follows that a 
period of almost limitless duration, so far as our 
standard of time is concerned, must have elapsed 
before changes so vast could be completed. How 
slow the work, that has not perceptibly advanced 
in many thousand years ! And just as the compo- 



CORRESPONDING CHANGES IN ANIMALS. 31 

sition of the air and its pressure have in this grad- 
ual manner passed through vast mutations, so like- 
wise has the heat of the globe. There was a time 
when the intrinsic heat — that is, that appertaining to 
the Earth itself — was so high, that the climate dif- 
ferences, such as we now observe, were altogether 
concealed. But as that intrinsic heat gradually es- 
caped away, and the globe became cooler and cooler, 
climates began to emerge. Now in this instance, as 
in the preceding, we are absolutely certain that there 
has been no recognizable diminution in many thou- 
sand years. Astronomical considerations establish 
that; for, among other things, the day must have 
become shorter, which has not been the case. We 
see, again, herein through what a limitless period 
the history of the Earth extends. 

Looking through that limitless vista, and bearing 
in mind the absolute control exerted by physical 
agencies over organic forms, on which we have been 
so strenuously insisting, what is it we should expect 
to see ? The physical influences — warmth, and press- 
ure, and composition of air, the distribution of land 
and sea, and a thousand other things, have changed. 
With them, animated nature must also have changed. 
In the dense and noxious atmosphere of the primeval 
times, quickly -respiring, hot-blooded animals could 
not possibly exist. Physiology teaches us that such 
conditions are absolutely incompatible with their 



32 EXTINCTION OF ANIMALS. 

life ; and, in corroboration, Geology proves that they 
did not appear until after the purification of the at- 
mosphere had been accomplished, and the natural 
conditions were in unison with their mode of life. 

The slowness of such changes in natural condi- 
tions implies, therefore, slow changes in the tribes 
of plants and animals — that is, in all organic forms. 
The former stands in the attitude of a cause, the lat- 
ter in the attitude of an effect. And in the same 
manner that in their succession, obediently to these 
principles, the successive groups of living things 
made their appearance, so, too, in obedience to these 
principles, numberless groups, whose conditions of 
life had become incompatible with the changed ex- 
terior conditions, were necessarily eliminated — that 
is, became extinct. Just as the Mastodon, which 
once roamed all over the American continent, dis- 
appeared, through inability to withstand the in- 
creasing rigor of the winter, so myriads of the in- 
habitants of the ocean, the land, the air, passed away. 
The extinction of species is a necessary natural inci- 
dent. 

It is sometimes objected, by those who have not 
duly weighed the vast body of evidence now bear- 
ing upon these points, that we are not authorized to 
assume such a prodigious period for the duration of 
the Earth as these facts seem to require. Whoever 
presses that objection must bear in mind that these 



OPERATION OF NATURAL LAW. 33 

conclusions depend not on the immature results of 
a single branch of science, but are enforced by the 
concurrent testimony of all. Astronomy, Physiolo- 
gy, Chemistry, Geology, bear a concordant evidence. 
It is not the part of wisdom to couple with a chro- 
nological fiction great moral considerations in which 
the w T ell-being of humanity is concerned. They will 
share in the discredit attaching; to its inevitable dis- 
comfiture. 

In the past history of the Earth there have then 
been slow variations in the vegetable and animal 
kingdoms, caused by slow variations in the condition 
of external nature. Physical influences have modi- 
fied organic forms. But now, if we rise to a higher 
point of view, and examine what has been the cause 
of the changes in those controlling influences them- 
selves, what is it that we see ? The operation of 
universal law ! In the special instance that has 
been occupying our attention — the decline of the 
earth's heat — an effect which has carried with it the 
most prodigious modifications both among living and 
lifeless things, that decline has been going on under 
the resistless operation of a law capable of mathemat- 
ical expression — a law absolutely independent, free 
from all possibility of change. Thus, when we pur- 
sue the scientific investigation of facts to the last ac- 
cessible point, there uniformly emerges the concep- 
tion, the idea of law — law ever -enduring, exhibiting 

C 



34 OPERATION OF NATURAL LAW. 

no variation, but so operating that ont of the inva- 
riable and eternal, the changeable and perishable 
spring forth. 

We gather, therefore, a most important lesson from 
inquiries respecting the origin, maintenance, distribu- 
tion, and extinction of animals and plants, their bal- 
ancing against one another — from the variations of 
aspect and form of an individual man, as determined 
by climate — from his social state, whether in repose 
or motion — from the secular variations of his opin- 
ions, and the gradual dominion of reason. This les- 
son is, that the government of the world is accom- 
plished by immutable law. 

Such a conception commends itself to the intellect 
of man by its majestic grandeur. It makes him dis- 
cern the eternal through the vanishing of present 
events, and ; through the shadows of time. From 
the life, the pleasures, the sufferings of humanity, it 
points to the impassive ; from our wishes, wants, and 
woes, to the inexorable. 

But, in thus ascending to primordial laws, and as- 
serting their immutability, universality, and para- 
mount control in the government of this world, there 
is nothing inconsistent with the free action of man. 
The appearance of things depends altogether on the 
point of view we occupy. He who is immersed in 
the turmoil of a crowded city sees nothing but the 
acts of men ; and, if he formed his opinion from his 



OPERATION OF NATURAL LAW. 35 

experience alone, must conclude that the course of 
events altogether depends on the uncertainties of hu- 
man volition. But he who ascends to a sufficient 
elevation loses sight of the passing conflicts, and no 
longer hears the contentions. He discovers that the 
importance of individual action is diminishing as the 
panorama beneath him is extending. And if he 
could attain to the truly philosophical, the general 
point of view, disengaging himself from all terrestrial 
influences and entanglements, rising high enough to 
see the whole globe at a glance, his acutest vision 
would fail to discern the slightest indication of man, 
his free will or his works. 

In whatever direction we look, we may therefore 
expect to find proofs of the dominion of law. Even 
in those cases where the voluntary agencies of man 
might seem to interfere, vestiges of that dominion 
are obvious enough. For instance, are not the great- 
est number of crimes against persons and property 
among the inhabitants of river banks? Does not 
the period of maximum of crimes against persons 
coincide with that which is the minimum against 
property — that is to say, the summer season ? As 
respects each individual, is it not well known that 
his tendency to crime is at first against property, and 
this reaches its maximum at about twenty-five years 
of age? In maturer life he substitutes stratagem 
for force. If brought up in a liberal profession, his 



36 INVARIABILITY OF HUMAN ACTS. 

tendency to crime is against persons, but that of the 
workman is against property. If we look from his 
premeditated sins to his venial oversights, we still 
find the same result. Of a million of letters put into 
the Post-oflice year after year, there will be a fixed 
number misdirected, and a fixed number on which 
he has neglected to put any address at all. 

It is the same with the other sex. In France, the 
tendency of females to crime, when compared with 
that of men, is as 23 to 100. Their tendency to the 
perpetration of offenses against persons is less than 
that for offenses against property in the proportion 
of 16 to 26. It also is interesting to observe that 
their physical force, if compared with that of man, is 
as the same numbers. From these and other such 
considerations, statesmen who have paid attention to 
the subject have come to the conclusion that the mo- 
rality of men and women is, if fairly estimated, about 
the same — a conclusion, it need hardly be said, very 
flattering to the vanity of the former, and therefore, 
in spite of the whispers of gallantry, we may accept 
it as substantially true. 

I have descended to these paltry facts, and quoted 
these seemingly trivial numbers, for the purpose of 
bringing into clearer relief the cardinal doctrine that 
in individual life, in social life, in national life, every 
thing is influenced by physical agents, and is there- 
fore under the control of law. Far from denying the 



PHYSIOLOGICAL ILLUSTRATION OF FREE WILL. 37 

operation of man's free will, I give to that great truth 
all the weight that can "be desired ; but then I affirm 
there is something that overrides, that forever keeps 
it in check. 

If the reader will try a very simple physiological 
experiment upon himself, he will probably come to a 
clearer understanding of what is here meant. Let 
him execute with his right hand the motion he 
would resort to in winding a thread upon a reel. 
Then let him do the same thing with his left hand, 
only winding the opposite way. Are not these two 
contrary motions which he thus consecutively accom- 
plishes thoroughly under his control? He wills to 
do either, and forthwith either is done. Both illus- 
trate his voluntary power. But next let him try to 
do both — not successively, but simultaneously. Let 
him put forth all the strength of his determination 
A free-mil actor, he has now the opportunity of giv 
ing an illustration of his power. In the failure of re 
peated trials, he may discern what his voluntary de 
terminations come to, and what they are really worth 
He may learn from this simple experiment that there 
is something that over-controls him, and puts a limit 
to his power. 

There are physiological laws that constrain society. 
There are physical boundaries beyond which society 
can not pass. There are ends that no human legisla- 
tion can accomplish. 



38 EFFECTS OF CLIMATE ON PLANTS. 

The publication of Humboldt's Essay on the Ge- 
ography of Plants first forcibly drew the attention 
of thinking persons to the control of climate over 
vegetables. Under the equator, where the heat is 
greatest, the Palm-tree, with its coronet of leaves, the 
banana and luxuriant climbing plants, give to the 
landscape its tropical characteristics. Advancing to 
the north or to the south, where the temperature is 
somewhat lower, there are evergreen woods in which 
flourish the orange and myrtle. Still journeying far- 
ther, these are succeeded by a zone of deciduous 
trees, such as the oak and the chestnut, and here 
the great climbers of the tropics are replaced by 
the hop and the ivy. Beyond, in a cooler zone, is 
a belt of firs, larches, pines, and other needle -leaved 
trees ; and this, as we advance to the pole, leads us 
through birches and mosses to the perpetually snow- 
covered ground where vegetation ceases. 

So, in like manner, as Tourneforte observed, a 
similar zone distribution occurs on the sides of 
mountains; the plants, as we ascend to the snow- 
covered peaks, being analogous to those occurring in 
succession on the surface as we advance to the poles. 
He first detected this fact while ascending Mount 
Ararat, about the year 1700, having jDreviously stud- 
ied the surface distribution in traveling from the Le- 
vant to Lapland. 

In both these distributions the regulating condi- 



INFLUENCE OF CLIMATE ON PLANTS. 39 

tion is the declining heat. That is the only cause 
common to the two cases. The temperature "becomes 
lower as we travel toward the pole, or ascend the 
mountain's side. 

Now, should any thing occur to occasion a change 
in this arrangement of climate zones, a corresponding 
movement would undoubtedly occur in the zones 
of plant distribution. Nay, more than that, species 
unable to stand the change would at once become 
extinct ; or if it occurred very slowly, they might, by 
undergoing modifications, be accommodated to it or 
acclimatized. So heat not only arranges the distribu- 
tion of vegetable forms on the face of the Earth, it 
can also determine their extinction or occasion their 
transformation. 

The influence of such variations of temperature is 
seen when we examine particular plants in different 
localities. Thus the Virginia cherry attains a height 
of a hundred feet in the Southern States, but it is 
dwarfed to a shrub of not more than five feet at the 
Great Slave Lake. The Nasturtium, which is a 
woody shrub in warm climates, is a succulent an- 
nual in cold. From such facts we learn this all-im- 
portant lesson — that organisms of every kind, so far 
from presenting any resistance to change, yield help- 
lessly to the influences to which they are exposed. 
The value of this conclusion, in its application to the 
case of man, we shall soon see. 



40 INFLUENCE OF CLIMATE ON MAN. 

The aspect of man in color and form oscillates be- 
tween two extremes. Submitted for a dne time to a 
high temperature, he will become dark, or if to a low 
temperature, he will become fair. The form of the 
skull will also alter. No race is in a state of abso- 
lute unchangeability, or able successfully to maintain 
its present physiognomy, if the circumstances under 
which it lives undergo alteration. It holds itself 
ready with equal facility to descend to a baser or to 
rise to a more elevated state, in correspondence to 
those circumstances. 

That climate does thus influence complexion is 
clearly illustrated by the natural history of the Jews. 
These men, indisputably derived from a common 
stock, have different colors in different countries. In 
the north of Europe they are fair, having blue eyes 
and red beards. As we trace them in their south- 
easterly distribution, their color deepens by degrees. 
In Palestine they have become tawny, in India of a 
deep brown, in Malabar almost black. I do not con- 
sider that the recent affirmation of the existence of 
two distinct Hebrew tribes, the auburn-bearded and 
the black-bearded, can be either historically or physi- 
ologically sustained. A still more general instance 
is offered by the race to which we belong, the Indo- 
European, which reaches from Hindostan to the Brit- 
ish Isles. That this is one homogeneous family, de- 
rived from a common stock, is proved by the affini- 



INDO-EUROPEANS. 41 

ties of its various languages to the Sanscrit. In near- 
ly all those various tongues, the family names, Father, 
Mother, Brother, Sister, Daughter, are the same re- 
spectively. A similar equivalence may be observed in 
a great many familiar objects — House, Door, Town, 
Path. It has been remarked that while this holds 
good for terms of a peaceful nature, many of those 
connected with warfare and the chase are different in 
the different languages. Such facts appear to prove 
that the emigrating column followed a nomadic and 
pastoral life. Many of the terms connected with 
such an avocation are widely diffused. This is the 
case with plowing, grinding, weaving, cooking, baking, 
sewing, spinning; with such objects as corn, flesh, 
meat, vestment; with wild animals common to Eu- 
rope and Asia, as the bear and the wolf. So, too, of 
words connected with social organization — despot, 
rex, queen. The numerals from 1 to 100 coincide in 
Sanscrit, Greek, Latin, Lithuanian, Gothic; but this 
is not the case with 1000, a fact which has led com- 
parative philologists to the conclusion that though, 
at the time of the emigration, a sufficient intellectual 
advance had been made to invent the decimal sys- 
tem, perhaps from counting upon the fingers, yet that 
it was very far from perfection. To the inhabitants 
of Central Asia the sea was altogether unknown; 
hence the branches of the emigrating column, as they 
diverged north and south, gave it different names. 



42 THE BLUE-EYED EACES. 

But, though unacquainted with the sea, they were 
familiar with salt, as is proved by the recurrence of 
its name. The bread-corn of the North is called rye, 
that of the South rice. Nor is it in the vocabularies 
alone that these resemblances are remarked; the 
same is to be said of the grammar. 

Of this homogeneous family of men, the Indo-Eu- 
ropean, the complexion in the northwest is light, but 
it darkens toward the southeast of India ; and, as if 
to guide us to the operating cause, this uniform deep- 
ening of the tint is broken through here and there as 
we cross regions more elevated above the sea, and 
therefore having a lower temperature. The inhabit- 
ants of the Caucasus and of the elevations of the 
Himmaleh Mountains are as light as the Southern 
Europeans, and there very frequently is seen the 
auburn-bearded and blue or gray eyed man. 

As plants may be modified by heat, so, too, may 
men. The Roman authors bear their concurrent tes- 
timony to the fact that, twenty centuries ago, the in- 
habitants of Britain, Gaul, and Germany were red- 
haired and blue -eyed. But no one would accept 
such a description as correct in our times. This 
gradual disappearance of the light complexioned may 
be said, in one sense, to be due to a climate change 
that has been artificially produced. The starved, 
half- naked, and almost houseless peasant savage of 
the times of Caesar struggled in his native forest with 



CHANGES OF THE SKULL. 43 

the cold. The well-fed, well- clothed, well-housed la- 
borer now is literally living in a warmer and more 
genial climate. Glass windows that keep out the 
weather, wooden floors and stoves, have proved to be 
equivalent to a more southerly locality. 

But it is not alone complexion that is altered ; the 
form of the skull is also changed. We should here 
remember the well -ascertained fact that the skull is 
modeled by the brain, and not the brain compressed 
into form by the skull. 

There are two typical forms of skull, popularly dis- 
tinguished as the savage and the civilized. The for- 
mer gives a detestable aspect to the countenance — a 
receding forehead, over which the hair encroaches on 
the eyebrows; the nostrils gaping, and seeming to 
enter directly backward into the head ; the jaw pro- 
jecting, the mouth open, the teeth uncovered. In 
the other the forehead is vertical; the brow expan- 
sive, and with an air of intellectuality ; the face capa- 
ble of expressing the most refined emotions ; the eyes 
in an indescribable but significant manner manifest 
the exalted powers of the mind, and the lips are com- 
posed or compressed. 

Between these two typical extremes there are 
many intermediate forms. Extreme heat or extreme 
cold, a life of physical hardship, tend to the produc- 
tion of the baser; a life of ease in a genial climate, to 
the higher type. And since our pursuits, and there- 



44 SYMMETRY OF THE BRAIN. 

fore our modes of thought, and therefore our feelings, 
depend upon the climate we are living in, its influ- 
ences Trill be indicated by the general construction 
of the brain, and therefore by the form of the skull. 

For perfection in the construction of the brain 
many conditions must be satisfied. It is not mere 
mass alone that is required, but also symmetrical or- 
ganization of the several parts. The most jDrominent 
characteristic of this organ is its symmetrical clouble- 
ness. It consists of two halves, a right and a left ; 
halves they ought hardly to be called, for each is 
complete in itself, and resembles its fellow. Every 
person has thus two perfect brains, each of which 
can conduct most of the usual mental acts. And, in- 
deed, this symmetrical doubleness occurs throughout 
all that portion of the nervous system which is de- 
voted, as physiologists term it, to animal life: so 
much so, that it might be affirmed that every person 
is composed of two symmetrical individuals, a right 
one and a left, which to a certain extent lead inde- 
pendent lives : for instance, one may be struck by 
palsy, the other may escape. 

These double organs do not double the intensity 
of our perceptions, but only render them more pre- 
cise. For current uses one side of the brain alone 
may be employed, but when we require greater ex- 
actness both are brought into play. They can give 
a separate, or a conjoint, or, as some singular facts 



CLIMATE EFFECT ON THE BRAIN. 45 

show, an alternating action. How often, when one 
hemisphere is engaged in some ordinary pursuit re- 
quiring its steady application, does the other disturb 
it with suggestions of a different kind, as by a strain 
of music or by a line of poetry. We may indulge 
simultaneously in two trains of thought, but never in 
three, for the simple reason that we have a double, 
but not a triple brain. So, in the pleasing operation 
of castle -building, one hemisphere listens to the ro- 
mance suggestions of the other, accepting them with 
gravity as if they were true, though very well know- 
ing that its comrade is only telling it a lie. 

Whatever interferes with the absolute equality of 
the right and left portions of the brain, affects the 
working of the mind. A skillful performer on the 
piano must use both hands with equal ease, and in 
like manner there is an ambi- dexterity of the brain. 
The metaphorical expression, a well-balanced mind, 
has really a profound scientific meaning. But, for 
securing in such a delicate organ as this absolute 
symmetry, how favorable all the external circum- 
stances must be! An intolerable heat, a rigorous 
cold, misery, want, a depressed social state, render it 
almost impossible. 

Such are some of the singular results of the sepa- 
rate operation of the two portions of the brain. In 
their conjoint action they present many facts well 
worthy of our attention. If one is inferior in organ- 



46 IMPERFECTIONS OF THE BBAIN. 

ization to the other, it will, under certain circum- 
stances, act discordantly, and insubordination or a 
want of consentaneous action occur. In many cases 
of insanity the healthy half is unable to control the 
diseased one, and hence we often observe in the in- 
sane that they have synchronously, or, at all events, in 
veiy rapid succession, two distinct trains of thought, 
and, consequently, two distinct utterances, each of 
which may be perfectly continuous, or even sane by 
itself, but the incongruities arising from the commin- 
gling of the two betray the condition of such per- 
sons. To a less marked extent — the same jDrinciple 
still, however, holding good — we may attribute the 
various declining decrees of mental brightness, until 
we come to persons who are intellectually quite ob- 
tuse and hardly able to reason. Such dullness may 
arise from a want of lateral symmetry, or from defect- 
ive development of the organ as respects the three 
lobes it exhibits when viewed in the front and back 
direction, or from absolute deficiency in its size. In 
the former case, the overcoming of insubordination 
of one of the hemispheres may to a considerable ex- 
tent be accomplished by education, of which one of 
the chief results is, that it exercises us in the habit 
of thinking of one thing at a time — of thinking, there- 
fore, without confusion, and of arriving at conclusions 
with precision and decision. 

But education, no matter how excellent it may be, 



EFFECTS OF CLIMATE ON THE BRAIN. 47 

can never establish an intellectual equality among 
men. It can do no more than bring each up to the 
standard that the perfection of his brain admits. 
There it must stop; and hence in all communities 
there must be descending grades of humanity. The 
lower social strata have a different direction of 
thought from the higher. It is impossible to edu- 
cate them completely, though it is possible to finish 
their education. It matters not in what direction 
their thoughts may be turned, the tokens of incapaci- 
ty appear. Their conceptions of political progress 
dwindle into a change of men. In the face of end- 
less disappointments, they think that they can gain 
their object by that inadequate device. 

Now not unintentionally have I been led into this 
digression on the modes of action of the brain. That 
organ is the instrument through which the mind 
works. An artisan can never display his skill if his 
tools be imperfect ; the mind can never demonstrate 
its innate excellence through a faulty apparatus. 
And hence we see that all that has been said about 
the influence of climate in controlling the develop- 
ment of man bears powerfully on this point. Our 
pursuits, our feelings, our modes of thought, depend 
on the theatre in which we live. 

When a nation emigrates to a new country, the 
climate of which differs from that of the country it 
has left, it slowly passes through modifications, at-. 



48 MODIFICATIONS OF MEN BY CLIMATE. 

tempting, as it were, to adapt itself to the changed 
circumstances under which it has now to live. Many 
generations may be consumed before a complete cor- 
respondence between its physiological condition and 
the climate to which it is exposed is attained. 

Its different classes will not make this movement 
with equal facility; some will accomplish it more 
quickly, others more slowly. Even when an equi- 
librium has been reached as completely as possible, 
there will still be distinct orders plainly enough per- 
ceptible among them. These orders depend upon a 
difference in individual intellectual development. 

To bring these general principles to bear on the 
special case of the inhabitants of the United States, 
it is necessary to examine the topographical construc- 
tion of the country, to examine its physical condition, 
its climate, its products, for such are the influences 
that model the character and determine the thoughts 
of men. 

The United States reach from the Atlantic to the 
Pacific, from the Lakes to the Gulf of Mexico. The 
midst of this vast territory is depressed so as to form 
a valley, ranging north and south, drained by a noble 
river. The Missouri-Mississippi, arising from the con- 
vergence of hundreds of streams, is nearly 4500 miles 
long, and navigable for nearly 3800 miles. 

This valley enjoys all the varieties of climate and 
all the diversities of physical character. At its limit 



DESCRIPTION OF THE UNITED STATES. 49 

in the far north it presents the vegetation of an al- 
most sub-arctic country; at the south, opening into 
the Gulf of Mexico, it has all the luxuriant foliage of 
the tropics. Its upper end is flanked Tby the great 
lakes. They contain nearly twelve thousand cubic 
miles of water — it is said, though perhaps erroneous- 
ly, half the fresh water of the globe ! The gigantic 
character of the forms into which the continent is 
cast is illustrated by the Cataract of Niagara, the 
most imposing waterfall in the world. 

On the east, the great valley is walled in by the 
ridge groups of the Alleghany system. At their foot 
is the Atlantic plain, reaching to the Atlantic Ocean, 
nearly level, and raised but little above that sea. 
This plain increases from a few miles in width at the 
north, to 150 at the south. It is intersected by a 
ridge of primary rocks, over which its rivers fall, and 
which in many places is the tide boundary and head 
of navigation. This ledge therefore determines the 
sites of many of the large towns or centres of com- 
merce. The plain itself is full of swamps, morasses, 
sluggish streams. It is infested with fever. 

On the west, leaving the line of the Mississippi 
and ascending the incline that culminates in the Pa- 
cific coast mountains, the aspect of Nature exhibits a 
gradual change. At first, in the ravines, there are 
thickets of the long -leaved willow, and roses, the 
most beautiful of the prairie flowers. Antelopes and 

D 



50 DESCRIPTION OF THE UNITED STATES. 

Deer run over the hills. In every direction the 
leaves of the prairie sage shine like silver as the 
wind turns them up to the sun. The streams are 
fringed with cottonwood and groves of oak, tenant- 
ed by nocks of turkeys. As the traveler advances, 
the cacti — plants that love dryness — become more 
and more numerous, and the shifting sands are work- 
ed into hills by the wind. In the streams, the beaver, 
yearly diminishing in numbers, builds his dam ; on 
the plains the prairie dog excavates his subterraneous 
village. 

Still more westwardly, the characteristic of the 
country is its extreme dryness. In a long day'sjour- 
ney water may not be met with. As the elevation 
increases, every thing looks as if it had been swept 
by fire ; even the stunted and dead pines present the 
prevailing dull, ash -colored hue of desolation. The 
bare hills assume grotesque forms of domes and min- 
arets, half deceiving the traveler into the belief that 
he is approaching some city of magicians in the des- 
ert. In this sandy and sterile region, the rich herb- 
age and nutritious grasses, that had furnished on the 
immense prairies pasturage for countless thousands 
of buifaloes, have given place to odoriferous plants 
with shrunken leaves. The snow line of the mount- 
ains, which even in the height of summer whitens 
the horizon, marks out the culminating ridge. The 
topography of the West differs from that of the East 



CLIMATE OF THE UNITED STATES. 51 

in this, that the highest range of mountains is near- 
est to the sea, The Coast Eange and the Sierra Ne- 
vada surpass the Kocky Mountains. The Columbia 
River alone breaks through the enormous barrier, 
and, in a region of gigantic pines, delivers its waters 
into the Pacific Ocean. 

Such is the domain of the United States. It is 
necessary, next, to consider its climate. On climate 
depends the distribution of vegetable and animal 
life; it also determines the pursuits and character 
of men. 

If a traveler leaves the coast of New England and 
goes to the West, he encounters successively four 
well-marked strands of climate. On the sea-board 
the temperature is moderated by the ocean ; at a lit- 
tle distance in the interior there is an excessive con- 
trast in the seasons ; gaining the region of the lakes, 
a moderate climate is again met with, and still be- 
yond that another excessive one. These vicissitudes 
arise from the action of great bodies of water, such 
as the Atlantic and the Lakes, in equalizing the heat. 
Along those parallels of latitude the mean annual 
temperature varies very little. The climate differ- 
ence is due to the unequal distribution of heat 
among the seasons. 

In excessive climates winter abruptly changes into 
summer with scarcely any intervening spring, and 
vegetation receives a sudden impulse. The charac- 



52 CLIMATE OF THE UNITED STATES. 

ter of man is also affected; for its proper develop- 
ment a succession of seasons is necessary. The ab- 
sence of summer is the absence of taste and genius ; 
where there is no winter loyalty is unknown. 

From the North let us turn to the South. If a 
traveler leaves the Atlantic coast of Upper Florida, 
where a high temperature always predominates, the 
Ocean and the Mexican Gulf conjointly control the 
heat, and the seasons glide into one another without 
marked extremes. There is a perpetual verdure. 
The Palmetto, the Orange, the Fig, grow without 
danger from the frost. There is no longer that vio- 
lent contrast between summer and winter experi- 
enced at the North. For instance, at Fort Snelling, 
in Minn., the difference of the mean temperature of 
those seasons is 56°; in Florida it is scarcely 12°. 
The skies are also clearer. While on the Lakes 
there are only 117 fair days in a year, on the Flor- 
ida coast there are more than 250. 

Though it is only a mere fringe of country that I 
have here considered, enough has been said to bring 
into relief the chief conclusion at which those who 
have carefully and attentively studied this subject 
have long ago arrived, viz., that the climate is more 
equable in the South than it is in the North. The 
irresistible consequence of this is, that in the South 
the pursuits of men have a greater sameness, their 
interests are more identical, they think and act alike. 



CHARACTER OF MEN IN THE NORTH AND SOUTH. 53 

In the North, the avocations of men must exhibit 
great differences. On the sea-board the commercial 
and manufacturing element must predominate ; then, 
through a broad zone, the agricultural. Ascending 
the incline to the mountain range, they must become 
mineralogical, a similar variation occurring in an in- 
verse order as the descent is made to the Pacific. 
The sandy desert can not fail to impress its special 
effects. These variations of interests and pursuits 
must produce a more heterogeneous population, and 
a great difference in intentions and thoughts. 

Let us look at this more closely. Let us recall 
some of those results which Physiologists and Phil- 
osophical historians have proved to be the conse- 
quences of those influences in Europe — results none 
the less interesting because they are old. Though 
holding good for another continent, they suggest ap- 
plications in ours. 

In the North the alternation of winter and sum- 
mer allots for the life of man distinct and different 
duties. Summer is the season of outdoor labor, win- 
ter is spent in the dwelling. In the South labor may 
be continuous, though it may vary. The Northern 
man must do to-day that which the Southern man 
may put off till to-morrow. For this reason the 
Northern man must be industrious; the Southern 
may be indolent, having less foresight and a less 
tendency to regulated habits. The cold, bringing 



54 CHARACTER OF MEN IN THE NORTH AND SOUTH, 

with it a partial cessation from labor, affords also 
an opportunity for forethought and reflection; and 
hence the Northern man acquires a habit of not act- 
ing without consideration, and is slower in the initia- 
tion of his movements. The Southern man is prone 
to act without reflection; he does not fairly weigh 
the last consequences of what he is about to do. 
The one is cautious, the other impulsive. Winter, 
with its cheerlessness and discomforts, gives to the 
Northern man his richest blessing ; it teaches him to 
cling to his hearthstone and his family. In times of 
Avar that blessing proves to be his weakness ; he is 
vanquished if his dwelling be seized. The Southern 
man cares nothing for that. Cut off from the prompt- 
ings of external Nature for so large a portion of the 
year, the mind in the North becomes self - occupied ; 
it contents itself with but few ideas, which it consid- 
ers from many points of view. It is apt to fasten it- 
self intently on one, and pursue it with fanatical per- 
severance. A Southern nation, which is continually 
under the influence of the shy, which is continually 
prompted to varying thoughts, will indulge in a su- 
perfluity of ideas, and deal with them all superficial- 
ly ; more volatile than reflective, it can never have a 
constant love for a fixed constitution. Once resolved 
to act, the intention of the North, sustained by rea- 
son alone, will outlast the enthusiasm of the South. 
In physical courage the two are equal; but the 



VARIETIES OF AMERICAN CLIMATE. 55 

North will prevail, through its habits of labor, of 
method, and its inexorable perseverance. Long ago, 
writers who have paid attention to these subjects 
have affirmed that the South will fight for the ben- 
efit of its leaders, but the North will conquer for the 
benefit of all. To convince the man who lives under 
a roof, an appeal must be made to his understand- 
ing ; to convince him who lives under the sky, the 
appeal must be to his feelings. 

Such are some of the general consequences ensuing 
from the action of climate upon men, and such repre- 
sent the effects which are occurring or have occurred 
on the population of the North American continent. 
The description I have given of this vast theatre of 
human life, though very superficial, is yet sufficient 
to impress the reader with a conviction of the won- 
derful variations of climate it presents — great differ- 
ences in annual mean temperature, and still greater 
ones in the distribution of heat through the seasons. 

But heat is only one of the controlling vital condi- 
tions. There are equally striking contrasts in the 
moisture and dryness of different regions; in the 
number of fair and of rainy days in the year ; in the 
range of movement in the barometer — that is, in the 
pressure of the air ; in the brightness of the light, or 
in its reverse dullness or cloudiness of the skies ; in 
topographical altitudes above the level of the sea. 
These and very many more such physical influences 



56 MODIFIED MEN IN AMERICA. 

exhibit a surprising complexity; and yet the more 
insignificant, as well as the more important, impress 
modifications on the constitution of man. 

From this, therefore, it follows that such a conti- 
nent, when its inhabitants shall have reached a con- 
cordance with the conditions to which they are ex- 
posed, will present numberless examples of modified 
men; the type from which they originated yielding 
helplessly to the powers operating upon it, and suf- 
fering variations not only in complexion, but in inte- 
rior constitution too. And since the American con- 
tinent not only rivals, but exceeds the continent of 
Europe in these differences, it necessarily follows 
that the families of modified men destined eventual- 
ly to be found upon it will be correspondingly more 
numerous than those now found on the Continent of 
Europe. The great differences so strikingly observed 
in the intellectual conceptions, and even in. the man- 
ner of thinking, in the Old World, will be exceeded 
in the New. 

That social stagnation so characteristic of Asia de- 
pends primarily on the equilibrium that has been at- 
tained, in the lapse of many ages, between the strands 
of its population and the climate zones in which they 
dwell. To no insignificant extent may the same be 
perceived in Europe, especially among the lower, that 
is, among the less locomotive portion of the 'inhabit- 
ants. But in no part of America has that exact con- 



EFFECT OF LOCAL CLIMATE CHANGES. 57 

cordance as yet had time or opportunity to "be truly es- 
tablished, though in the Southern States an approach 
has been made to it. Moreover, the climate is con- 
tinually undergoing local modifications through the 
operations of agriculture and other causes, and the 
conditions under which life is carried on in civilized 
communities are varying through the introduction 
of new and important inventions. The construction 
of houses, and the means of combating the rigors of 
winter by the better warming of them; the increas- 
ing resort to a preservation of ice, to meet in various 
applications the heats of summer ; a habit of resort- 
ing to higher and cooler regions for the same pur- 
pose, are all having their effect. And, what is of not 
less importance, the daily food of extensive districts 
is changing. Improved means of locomotion are 
bringing within the reach of the consumer, even 
though he may be in the less affluent station of life, 
articles to which he was formerly a stranger. 

Those improved means of locomotion likewise stim- 
ulate all classes to travel. In America a journey of 
a thousand miles is considered, even by the laboring 
population, as a small affair scarce needing any prep- 
aration. The necessary result of such personal mo- 
bility is, that families are perpetually changing their 
places of abode. The physiological equilibrium which 
might have been attained by a more stationary life 
is procrastinated. Society presents the aspect of an 



58 CLIMATE AND POLITICAL STABILITY. 

ever-changing, ever-struggling mass — a state of things 
the very opposite to that observed in Asia. 

Uniformity of climate makes people homogeneous. 
They will necessarily think alike, and inevitably act 
alike. 

Where variation in successive generations is not 
taking place, immobility in national institutions is 
possible. 

The first and most important condition for the 
prosperity of a great nation is stability in its insti- 
tutions. 

But stability must be carefully distinguished from 
immobility. We must bear in mind that the affairs 
of men are ever changing ; successive generations live 
under essentially different conditions; public neces- 
sities are therefore continually varying, and disorder 
arises as soon as Institutions prescribe one course and 
Necessity demands another. 

To insure stability, the political system must there- 
fore admit of change — that change being in accord- 
ance with a law of variation which depends on a 
fixed principle. Unchangeability should belong to 
the law, not to the institutions issuing from it. 

In that manner alone can order and progress co- 
exist, and the demand made by modern statesman- 
ship with so much solicitude be satisfied. It truly 
affirms that there can be no real Order without Prog- 
ress, and no real Progress without Order. 



CHANGES IN POLITICAL INSTITUTIONS. 59 

Institutions well adapted for five millions of peo- 
ple will certainly be very unsuitable for fifty. Insti- 
tutions intended for a narrow coast line will certain- 
ly be inadequate if applied to one of the quarters of 
the globe. Edifices, though they may be built of 
iron, will fall to pieces if the architect has not made 
provision for expansion at one point and contraction 
at another. Where motion must in the necessities 
of the case occur, it is essential for safety that there 
should be a harmony among the moving parts. In- 
equality of progressive movement implies strain — 
strain implies fracture. 

It is therefore the province of statesmanship to de- 
termine how change shall be provided for in political 
institutions, and what is the true nature of the law 
by which they shall be modified. Above all, it is its 
province to discover the immutable principles on 
which that law must rest. 

It is better for communities to advance through 
legal forms than by revolutionary impulses, or by at- 
tempting to secure stability through incessantly fail- 
ing experiments. The only safe guide for them to 
follow is furnished by a careful investigation of the 
circumstances under which their life has been and is 
to be spent. 

The life of a feeble colony is simple. When it has 
become a widespread and powerful nation, its neces- 
sities are numerous and contradictory. The chances 



60 NATURE OF SOCIAL PROGRESS. 

that they will be contradictory increase as the phys- 
ical circumstances of the country are more diversified. 

Hence it is that a nation lying east and west will 
generally have less discordant interests than one the 
range of which is north and south. Climate varies 
in this latter case much more than it does in the 
former. 

Society, therefore, pressed upon relentlessly by Na- 
ture, passes through a definite series of changes. It 
runs through a predestined career. It is never in a 
state of rest, as politicians too often suppose, but al- 
ways in motion. It has a past from which it is com- 
ing, a future to which it is going. It also has an un- 
avoidable end. 

A nation, as it passes from phase to phase, is 
guided by definite natural laws, and depends upon 
definite conditions. There must be an unfailing sup- 
ply of new parts to take the place of the old that 
are being unceasingly removed. There must also be 
a simultaneous grouping or moulding. Its life is to 
outlast by far the life of any of its constituent parts, 
or even of many generations of them. Its wants and 
its wishes will vary with circumstances and times. 
Half-educated people vainly persuade themselves, and 
demagogues try to persuade others, that it is possible 
to devise a political constitution so perfect that it 
will never need change. A constitution may be in- 
trinsically good in so far as it suits a present genera- 



NATURE OF SOCIAL PROGRESS. 61 

tion and a short time. But there is goodness of a 
higher order, depending on a plasticity that can 
adapt itself to varying circumstances and stand the 
shocks of Time. 

In the popular view, a nation arises independently 
of others. Without any disturbance it might never 
have existed. But nations should not be regarded 
as isolated forms. They are, in reality, an organic se- 
ries connected together. Each has bonds with those 
that are past and with those that are to come. In 
its position each is perfect in itself. It is an incarna- 
tion of natural influences upon humanity at a given 
epoch. There is, therefore, a chain of Empires, whose 
first link is far back in the darkness of pre-historic 
times. 

Such an interconnected succession implies cause 
and effect — the steady dominion of natural law. It 
means the continuous advancement of humanity. 

From infancy man slowly emerges into childhood, 
from that into youth, from that to maturity. Each 
of these stages brings with it changes of character, 
making him feel differently and think differently. 
In that resistless development have we any volun- 
tary concern ? Could we have arrested its march by 
any desire, or could we have diverted its course ? 
We have made the same passage that has fallen to 
the lot of every human being, and as for our prede- 
cessors, so for us, there awaits us the unpitying 



Q2 COMPARATIVE HISTORY. 

grave. We came into the world without our own 
knowledge, we are departing from it against our own 
will. 

In that great branch of literature of which we now 
only see the dim beginning — Comparative History — 
the series of Nations, viewed by the light of individ- 
ual life, will be hereafter considered. Nations will 
be regarded not as mere accidents, or creative blun- 
ders, or experimental attempts, but as emerging from 
the bosom of humanity through predetermining 
causes. It will treat of their march of development, 
showing why one has been arrested at an early stage 
in its life, another has advanced more completely to 
maturity, another has expended its vital powers, and 
died, as it were, of old age. It will show that there 
is a general equation of National life, and that special 
nations are special solutions of it. It will prove that 
nations are not individuals, but only forms into 
which humanity is thrown — mere transitory combi- 
nations, of which the inevitable issue is dissolution, 
death. For the constituent men of whom they were 
composed there may be an immortality, but that does 
not imply immortality for the resulting form. The 
material particles of which the flame of a lamp is 
composed we know are indestructible, eternal, but 
who shall say whither that flame has gone when 
once blown out ! 



ILLUSTRATION FROM EGYPTIAN HISTORY. Qg 

Perhaps I can not more impressively enforce the 
principles that have been explained on the foregoing 
pages, particularly those that assert the control of 
Climate over the actions of man, than by presenting 
one or two historical reminiscences. From many in- 
stances, I select the cases of Egypt and of Asia. 

European civilization originated in Egypt. For 
thirty-four centuries before our era that country was 
governed by dynasties of kings succeeding each other 
without interruption. Its soil, proverbially fertile, 
sustained a population estimated in the most prosper- 
ous times at about seven millions ; and repeated mil- 
itary expeditions into Asia and Ethiopia had, in the 
course of ages, concentrated in it immense wealth, 
and crowded with captives and slaves the valley of 
the Nile. 

Until about seven hundred years before Christ the 
inhabitants of that country had been shut out from 
all Mediterranean or European contact by a rigorous 
exclusion exceeding that until recently practiced in 
China and Japan. As from the inmates of "The 
Happy Valley 17 in Easselas no tidings escaped into 
the outer world, so to the European the Valley of 
the Nile was a region of mysteries and marvels. 
Uncertain legends were current all over Asia Mi- 
nor, Greece, Italy, Sicily, of the prodigies and mira- 
cles that adventurous pirates reported they had ac- 
tually seen in their stealthy visits to the enchanted 



64 ILLUSTRATION FROM EGYPTIAN HISTORY. 

valley — great pyramids covering acres of land, their 
tops rising to the heavens, yet each pyramid nothing 
more than the tombstone of a king — Colossi sitting 
on granite thrones, the images of Pharaohs who had 
lived in the morning of the world, still silently look- 
ing upon the land which thousands of years before 
they had ruled ; of these, some, obedient to the Sun, 
saluted his approach when touched by his morning 
rays — Obelisks of prodigious height, carved by su- 
perhuman skill from a single block of stone, and 
raised by superhuman power erect on their everlast- 
ing pedestals, their faces covered with mysterious 
hieroglyphics, a language unknown to the vulgar, 
telling by whom and for what they had been con- 
structed — Temples, the massive leaning and lower- 
ing walls of which were supported by countless 
ranges of statues — avenues of Sphinxes, through the 
shadows of which, grim and silent, the portals of 
fanes might be approached — Catacombs containing 
the mortal remains of many generations, each corpse 
awaiting in mysterious embalmment a future life — 
Labyrinths of many hundred chambers and vaults, 
into which whoso entered without a clew never again 
escaped, but in the sameness and silence of those end- 
less windings found his sepulchre. 

In the security of this inaccessible retreat, and 
under political institutions of a favorable character, 
the civilization which was to be conferred, through 



ILLUSTRATION PROM EGYPTIAN HISTORY. 65 

Greece on Europe originated. Each year since the 
country has been open to investigation and its hiero- 
glyphic system understood, the impressions we re- 
ceive of its intellectual advancement have been more 
and more favorable. The vocal statue of Memnon 
at Thebes, it is said, emitted a musical sound when 
touched by the rays of the sun. In the light of mod- 
ern criticism, every obelisk and monument of those 
desolated palaces is finding a voice. 

As a critical attention is bestowed by modern 
scholars upon Egyptian remains, we learn more truly 
what is the place in history of that venerable coun- 
try. From Egypt, it now appears, were derived the 
prototypes of the Greek architectural orders, and 
even their ornaments and conventional designs ; 
thence came the models of the Greek and Etruscan 
vases ; thence many of the ante - Homeric legends — 
the accusation of the dead, the trial before the judges 
of Hell, the reward and punishment of every man, 
the dog Cerberus, the Stygian stream, the lake of ob- 
livion, the piece of money, Charon and his boat, the 
fields of Elysium, the islands of the blessed. Thence 
came the first ritual for the dead, litanies to the Sun, 
and painted or illuminated missals ; thence came the 
dogma of a queen of heaven. What other country 
ever offered such noble and enduring edifices to the 
gods? — temples with avenues of sphinxes — massive 
pylons adorned with obelisks in front, which even 

E 



66 ILLUSTRATION FROM EGYPTIAN HISTORY. 

imperial Rome and modern Paris have not thought it 
beneath them to appropriate — porticoes and halls of 
columns on which were carved the portraits of kings 
and the effigies of gods. The Pyramids have seen 
the Old Empire, the Hyksos monarchs, the New Em- 
pire, the Persian, the Macedonian, the Roman, the 
Mohammedan. They have stood still, while heaven 
itself has changed. They were already five hundred 
years old when the Southern Cross disappeared from 
the horizon of the countries of the Baltic. The Pole 
Star itself is a new comer to them. Another and a 
more "brilliant star, now far removed, then occupied 
that conspicuous place. 

"What was it that thus placed Egypt in the van 
of our civilization, and gave her the precedence of 
Europe ? '. 

The progress of human generations is shaped by 
the physical circumstances in which they live. 

The Nile, the mysterious river of antiquity — myste- 
rious now no more — takes a northerly direction from 
equatorial Africa through a valley, overflowing its 
banks once each year, sj)reading a fertile mud to the 
edge of the sandy desert, and encroaching perpetual- 
ly on the Mediterranean Sea. All Lower Egypt has 
been made by it. The arable strand thus formed va- 
ries in width from two to about eleven miles. 

In one all-important particular Egypt differed from 
most other places — the agricultural result of its sea- 



PERMANENCE OF EGYPT. (fl 

sons could be foretold. Elsewhere men depend for 
the fruits of the earth on uncertain rains, in Egypt 
they depended on the inundations. If in the month 
of July the water has only risen twelve feet, it is 
known that the harvests will be scanty ; if to twenty- 
one feet, that they will be plentiful. A system of 
reservoirs and dikes, floodgates and other hydraulic 
apparatus, had been contrived in the remotest times. 
The government took charge of the river, delivering 
water from it in a regulated manner, and remunera- 
ting itself by a tax. 

Agriculture thus became a reliable art. The peo- 
ple were relieved from the uncertainties of the future, 
The river was to them all a common interest, a com- 
mon bond of union. Where there is a bond like 
that, its political consequences can hardly be exagger- 
ated. Moreover, the climate throughout the whole 
of Egypt proper was very uniform. 

The remark has already been made on a previous 
page that uniformity of Climate makes people homo- 
geneous. They will necessarily think alike, and in- 
evitably act alike. 

Here, then, was a people having common ideas and 
common intentions. Its consolidation and civiliza- 
tion were assured. A Colossus with its hands rest- 
ing upon its knees typified what the nation really 
was. Every thing seemed eternal, no change proba- 
ble, no catastrophe possible. 



53 IMMOBILITY OF EGYPT. 

It is not surprising, then, that the two great divis- 
ions of the country — Upper and Lower Egypt — "be- 
came consolidated at an early epoch, and in all the 
vicissitudes of prosperity and adversity were never 
subsequently separated. 

In this invariable climate, held together by a com- 
mon interest and a common bond, generations of 
Egyptians for forty centuries and more succeeded 
one another. Each one was like all its predeces- 
sors. There was nothing to produce modification. 
The mould into which Nature poured her living ma- 
terial underwent no Mud of change. The casts that 
she procured were all alike. 

Egypt is therefore an exemplification of the gen- 
eral principle that where variation in successive gen- 
erations is not taking place, immobility in national 
institutions is possible. 

Of Asia it has long been remarked that it is a 
continent without any temperate zone. The vast 
mountain axis which in an irregular manner divides 
it, throws it into two slopes, one looking to the north, 
the other to the south. Apart, however, from this, 
which undoubtedly impresses a general feature of 
violent contrast on its meteorology, its local variations 
are such as to give rise to many diversities of climate, 
marked in a sufficiently distinct manner, though not 
so abrupt or so frequent as is the case in Europe. It 



ILLUSTRATION FROM THE HISTORY OF ASIA. 69 

necessarily, therefore, presents numerous examples of 
distinctly modified men. 

Receiving its human population at an epoch ante- 
rior to that of the peopling of Europe, Asia has al- 
ways been regarded as the birthplace of man. On 
a previous page has been given a portion of that 
large body of evidence accumulated by Comparative 
Philologists in proof of the fact that the present in- 
habitants of Europe are of Oriental descent. 

The activity that must have existed in its early 
history, when from one, or at the most a few centres, 
its teeming population was rapidly spreading in ev- 
ery direction, and accomplishing the settlement of its 
various districts, has long ago given place to stagna- 
tion. At intervals centuries apart there have poured 
from it devastating hordes that have precipitated 
themselves on Europe. These have commonly melt- 
ed away in the populations they overran, and have 
scarcely left any trace of their existence in the coun- 
tries from which they emerged. 

In some instances such warlike emigrating columns 
have been set in motion by military chieftains or by 
internal civil commotions ; but not unfrequently they 
have originated, there is every reason to believe, in 
the consequences of those geological changes to which 
the Eastern Continent is subject — changes which di- 
vert the courses of rivers and modify the lines of 
travel. On the nomadic population of the northern 



70 STAGNANT CONDITION OF ASIA. 

slope such, effects are widespread disasters, compel- 
ling the tribes into a forced emigration down the 
gentle incline — the path zone — that leads out of Asia 
into Europe. 

Exception made of these convulsive social move- 
ments, the entire population of that continent is in a 
stagnant condition. There is nothing to excite loco- 
motion. At the best, the numberless states and 
forms of government existing, restrict intercommuni- 
cation within very narrow bounds. Over vast tracts 
of country the traveler can not pass without risk of 
liberty or life. So many different languages, so many 
different chieftains, present insuperable obstacles to 
movement. 

The influence of religious opinions also exerts a 
powerful effect. Among many millions it is thought 
unholy to go to sea. The lines of journey, such as 
they are, remain unaltered and unimproved for suc- 
cessive centuries — unaltered unless by the movements 
or acts of Nature. The venerable caravanserai re- 
ceives its evening travelers just as it did centuries 
ago. The patient camel on the southwestern slope, 
and the rude wagon on the northern, pursue their 
wearisome courses just as they did in the days of 
Alexander. 

It may therefore be said that the Asiatic popula- 
tions have truly lost locomotion — they have become 
stationary, vast multitudes during their whole lives 



CAUSE OF THAT CONDITION. 71 

scarcely leaving the places where they were born. 
Successive ages have left an indelible impression. 
In all directions, the people have come into physio- 
logical correspondence with the natural conditions in 
which they are living. In this perfect correspond- 
ence lies the secret of their stagnant state. 

Stagnant it emphatically is ! There are no changes 
in the fashions of clothing, no improvements in the 
habitations, no bettering of food. As their ancestors 
in past times lived, so do they. Oppression may 
have sometimes driven them to revolt, the intrigues 
of leading men may have sometimes plunged them 
into war, but it never occurs to them to modify the 
political system under which they may happen to 
live, any more than it occurs to bees to change the 
economy of their hive. The utmost they ever accom- 
plish is to exchange their tyrant. They do not seek 
to get rid of the tyranny. In Asia the sense of po- 
litical improvement is lost. Crushed by the relent- 
less tread of centuries, they can only appreciate tran- 
quillity and rest. Without a murmur or even a wish, 
they leave Europe to seek and sigh for freedom. 

To this correspondence which the lapse of time has 
accomplished between their physiological condition 
and the theatre of their life, we must attribute that 
propensity to religious aspirations which has for so 
long marked their character, and which has so pro- 
foundly impressed all other portions of the world. 



72 ANCIENT ACTIVITY OF ASIA. 

Buddhism, Mohammedanism, Judaism, the religious 
faiths of nearly eight hundred millions of men, are 
all of Asiatic origin. Moreover, it must not be for- 
gotten that Palestine was the birthplace of Christian- 
ity. The irrepressible tendency of Europe is to phi- 
losophy, that of Asia is to religion. The former 
looks forth on the exterior world, investigating the 
events of Nature, and profiting by the application of 
the discoveries it makes. The latter looks inwardly 
upon itself. Motionless, like its own Fakirs, it is ab- 
sorbed in self - contemplation, and has fallen into a 
trance. 

It was not, however, always thus in the East. In 
times of which History has failed to preserve any ac- 
count, that continent must have been the scene of 
prodigious human activity. In it were first devel- 
oped those fundamental inventions and discoveries 
which really lie at the basis of the progress of the 
human race — the subjugation of domestic animals, 
the management of fire, the expression of thought by 
writing. "We are apt to overlook how much man 
must have done, how much he must have added to 
his natural powers in pre-historic times. We forget 
how many contributions to our own comforts are of 
Oriental origin. Their commonness hides them from 
our view. If the European wishes to know how 
much he owes to the Asiatic, he has only to cast a 
glance at an hour of his daily life. The clock which 



OBLIGATIONS OF EUROPE TO ASIA. 73 

summons Mm from his bed in the morning was the 
invention of the East, as also were clepsydras and 
sun-dials. The prayer for his daily bread, that he has 
said from his infancy, first rose from the side of a 
Syrian mountain. The linens and cottons with which 
he clothes himself, though they may be very fine, are 
inferior to those that have been made for time imme- 
morial in the looms of India. The silk w T as stolen 
by some missionaries for his benefit from China. He 
could buy better steel than that with which he 
shaves himself in the old city of Damascus, where it 
was first invented. The coffee he expects at break- 
fast was first grown by the Arabians, and the na- 
tives of Upper India prepared the sugar with which 
he sweetens it A school -boy can tell the mean- 
ing of the Sanscrit words sacchara canda. If his 
tastes are light and he prefers tea, the virtues of 
that excellent leaf were first pointed out by the in- 
dustrious Chinese. They also taught him how to 
make and use the cup and saucer in which to serve 
it. His breakfast tray was lacquered in Japan. 
There is a tradition that leavened bread was first 
made of the waters of the Ganges. The egg he is 
breaking was laid by a fowl whose ancestors were 
first domesticated by the Malaccans, unless she may 
have been — though that will not alter the case — a 
modern Shanghai. If there are preserves and fruits 
on his board, let him remember with thankfulness 



74 OBLIGATIONS OF EUROPE TO ASIA. 

that Persia first gave him the Cherry, the Peach, the 
Plum. If in any of these pleasant preparations he 
detects the flavor of alcohol, let it remind him that 
that substance was first distilled by the Arabians, 
who have set him the praiseworthy example, which 
it will be for his benefit to follow, of abstaining from 
its use. When he talks about coffee and alcohol, he 
is using Arabic words. A thousand years before it 
had occurred to him to enact laws of restriction in 
the use of intoxicating chinks, the Prophet of Mecca 
did the same thing, and, what is more to the purpose, 
has compelled to this day all Asia and Africa to 
obey them. We gratify our taste for personal orna- 
ments in the way the Orientals have taught us — with 
pearls, rubies, sapphires, diamonds. Of public amuse- 
ments it is the same. The most magnificent fireworks 
are still to be seen in India and China; and as re- 
gards the pastimes of private life, Europe has pro- 
duced no invention that can rival the game of Chess. 
We have no hydraulic constructions as great as the 
Chinese Canal, no fortifications as extensive as the 
Chinese Wall ; we have no Artesian wells that can at 
all approach in depth some of theirs. We have not 
yet resorted to the practice of obtaining coal gas from 
the interior of the earth ; they have borings for that 
purpose more than 3000 feet deep. 

Through the long -continued influence of Climate 
action a different mental constitution has been im- 



THE EUROPEAN AND THE ASIATIC. 75 

parted to the inhabitants of Europe and of Asia. 
The mind of the latter has become essentially syn- 
thetic, that of the former analytic. The Asiatic is 
the creator of systems of Theology, Law, Philosophy, 
some of which have endured for thousands of years, 
and have been adopted by a large portion of the hu- 
man race. The European pursues his course in a 
way less grand, but which, since it has a better ascer- 
tained foundation, leads to more certain, and, as the 
course of centuries will show, more powerful, wide- 
spread, and equally lasting results. In Asia, as we 
have seen, customs and fashions remain invariable ; 
every thing is in a state, as we term it, of stagnation, 
or, as they consider it, of repose. On the other hand, 
the analytical tendency of the European has led to 
the intellectual and political anarchy of our times, 
when fundamental doctrines of every kind are called 
in question, and scarcely two men can be found 
whose views on religious, political, and social ques- 
tions coincide. In Asia there are no questions, only 
affirmations. Europe, except when the Church for a 
thousand years enforced the Asiatic system, has ever 
been prone to ask questions. Since the fourteenth 
century, when she returned to that propensity, she 
has been passing through a chaos of doubt in the in- 
numerable answers she receives. 

I trace, therefore, the stagnant condition of the 
Asiatic populations to that correspondence into which 



76 THE POLITICAL STATE OF ASIA. 

they have slowly been brought with the physical cir- 
cumstances in which they live. They have come into 
a condition of physiological repose. The consequence 
is, that they have come into a condition of political 
repose also. Barriers not only of a material, but of 
an intellectual kind, the consequences of those events, 
are now fettering them, cramping them. They are 
held in the iron grasp of a hundred tyrannies, and, 
what is indeed more effectual, are parted from one 
another by many different tongues. 

The consequence of this physiological correspond- 
ence has been the permanent establishment of the va- 
rious governments that divide the continent. These 
may from time to time suffer interior change through 
civil commotions or mutual war, but the aspect of 
Oriental life has remained unaltered for several thou- 
sand years. The many National forms that have 
sprung into existence tend to aid Climate in its influ- 
ence and perpetuate a common effect. From being 
originally consequences, they have assumed the atti- 
tude of causes. 

And yet it is not beyond the bounds of possibility 
that this deplorable state of things should change, 
and, those old, worn - out populations disappearing, 
races of new-comers take their place — new-comers 
arising, perhaps, in large part from the intermixture 
of people who, not having that physiological corre- 
spondence with the countries in which they were 



PROSPECTIVE CHANGES IN ASIA. 77 

thrown, could renew the scene of struggle, the scene 
of activity again. Asia has given to Europe its relig- 
ion. Europe may hereafter repay the debt by giving 
to Asia her improved means of locomotion. Once 
let those torpid communities be set in movement, 
once mix them up again by travel, by commerce, and, 
by their consequence, intermarriage, and the aspect 
of things would quickly change. In Europe itself, 
the rapid modes of locomotion — inappreciably valu- 
able inventions of our age — are inciting an impend- 
ing revolution. They extend the sphere of individual 
life; bring diverse populations, that misinterpreted 
and misunderstood one another, face to face ; remove 
national prejudices; refine the public manners; and 
elevate the public mind. Asia, the land of miracles, 
may yet be destined to exhibit the greatest of polit- 
ical wonders. Interior motion may revolutionize that 
continent. 

Turning from these special cases, to which many 
others might be added if there were occasion, I shall 
now endeavor to bring plainly into relief the facts 
that have been considered in the preceding pages. 
What is it they amount to ? This — that the body 
of man can not resist external influences. It is help- 
lessly modified by heat and cold, dryness, moisture — 
that is, by Climate. The complexion of the skin 
changes, as also does the construction of the brain. 



78 EFFECTS OF CLIMATE IN AMERICA. 

In a restricted locality there may therefore be a same- 
ness in the population ; but in a vast continent, where 
there are all kinds of climate, there will inevitably be 
all kinds of modified men. Their thoughts and their 
actions must necessarily be diverse. To unite them 
under one government becomes, then, proportionably 
more and more difficult. But now, if there be a point 
on which America as a nation has come to an irrevo- 
cable resolve, it is that one government alone shall 
hold sway on this continent. Then let us look the 
physical difficulty plainly in the face. Though for- 
midable, it is not insuperable. 

Look at that zone of American population inhabit- 
ing the countries in which the cotton-plant can grow. 
Does not the luxuriance of that delicate product, that 
so quickly suffers on the approach of cold, imply a 
homogeneous climate? Is it surprising that there 
should be a mental sameness, a concordance among 
the inhabitants in their manner of thinking? We 
have seen that a common climate makes men think 
alike and act alike. 

Turn now to that other zone, stretching from the 
Atlantic westwardly in the direction of the great 
lakes. Here there is none of that climate homoo-e- 
neousness occurring in the other case. Even before 
the region of the lakes is fairly reached, four distinct 
strands of different temperature have been passed 
through. Follow that zone with a prophetic eye, as 



EFFECTS OF CLIMATE IN AMERICA. 79 

it becomes peopled to the shores of the Pacific Ocean, 
and tell me, as those busy hordes extend over the 
vast sandy desert, climb up the threatening ridges of 
the mountain chains, descend through the moaning 
forests of enormous pines beyond, how many are the 
vicissitudes through which life must be maintained, 
and I will tell you how many distinct families of men 
there must be. 

We must steadily bear in mind the principle that 
has forced itself so strongly on our attention. Scientif- 
ic Physiology has no better ascertained fact than that 
man possesses no innate resistance to change. The 
moment he leaves his accustomed place of abode to 
encounter new physical conditions and altered modes 
of life, that moment his structure commences slowly 
to change. It may take several generations before 
an equilibrium is reached. Then his countenance, his 
complexion, his hair, testify to what has been going 
on. 

Public policy should therefore hold these great 
facts steadily in view, and shape its course accord- 
ingly. It should not only discern herein the hidden 
causes of those dreadful events through which, as a 
Nation, we are passing, it should also foresee that this 
is the rugged path through which, in the future, des- 
tiny leads us. To the innate sympathies and antip- 
athies thus engendered the demagogue will in all fu- 
ture time appeal. As they have clone in our day, so 



80 EFFECTS OF CLIMATE IN AMERICA. 

will tliey ever hereafter constitute an instrument apt 
for his purpose. We have been called upon to deal 
with the variations as they now exist, our descend- 
ants will have to deal with the greater variations 
coming. No European nation can serve us as an 
exemplar, for none has encountered a problem so 
complicated and vast. The nearest approach to its 
solution was made by the Roman Empire, but that 
lay, for the most part, in an easterly and westerly di- 
rection, in which the wants and intentions of men 
were very much the same. That imperial system 
was intrinsically unable to extend itself north and 
south. Had it made such an extension, the difficulty 
of its government would have been far greater than 
it was. Whoever will study its disintegration and 
disruption will see how true these principles are. 

And here I can not help making the remark, that 
whoever accepts these principles as true, and bears in 
mind how physical circumstances control the deeds 
of men, as it may be said, in spite of themselves, will 
have a disposition to look with generosity on the 
acts of political enemies. Even when in madness 
they have rushed to the dread arbitrament of civil 
war — a crime in the face of which all other crimes 
are as nothing — and brought upon their country im- 
measurable woes, he will distinguish the instrument 
from the cause, and, when he has overpowered, will 
forgive. 



UNION IN EUROPE. 81 

Philosophy alone can raise man to that grand ele- 
vation which enables him to perform acts that cen- 
turies will admire. Philosophy alone can place him 

"Above all pain, all passion, and all pride, 
Above the reach of flattery's baleful breath, 
The lust of lucre, and the dread of death." 

There are things that no human legislation can ac- 
complish. Perhaps he who considers the supreme 
difficulties incident to our political position may look 
at the picture almost in despair, and come to the con- 
clusion that in such a case no human statesmanship 
can avail. 

But let us take courage. Once in the history of 
the world has a parallel attempt at the union of a 
continent been made. In the eleventh century was 
born a great man, who resolved to convert all Eu- 
rope into one federation, with the Sovereign Pontiff 
at its head, and Emperors and Kings his proconsuls 
— that Europe which, as we have seen, presents all 
sorts of climates and all kinds of modified men. A 
religious foundation was, under the circumstances, 
the only one that could be given to the contemplated 
structure; but Gregory VII. saw not only its capa- 
bilities, but its defects, as any one may find who will 
consider his relations with the heretic Berengar. 
Those defects he would have remedied if he could, 
and brought that foundation into more complete ac- 
cordance with human reason. 

F 



82 UNION IN AMERICA. 

What was the practical instrument on which Greg- 
ory VII. relied in carrying out his intention? His 
legates conld pass from Scotland to Spain, from the 
Atlantic to the confines of Asia, and meet in every 
monastery and at every church men speaking the 
same tongue. The Latin language gave him intelli- 
gent allies all over Christendom, but allies only 
among the men of education. With us, how much 
better is the prospect — one language from ocean to 
ocean, and that among the lowly as well as the high. 
That bond of union is for us a bond of strength. It 
aids in compensating for diversities of climate. It 
gives us a common history of the past, a common 
hope for the future. Conterminous groups of men 
are far more effectually isolated by different forms of 
speech than by intervening rivers and mountains, but 
groups that are far apart may be in communion 
through a common tongue. They may learn to have 
faith in the greatness and permanence of their polit- 
ical creations, and in unbroken unity discern uncon- 
querable power. 

With such an inappreciable advantage in our fa- 
vor, we are encouraged to look again at the great 
problem before us, and to ask, Can we not neutralize 
those climate differences, which, if unchecked, must 
transmute us into different nations ? 

In two words, I think, we find an answer — Educa- 
tion and Intercommunication. Nor is this the sug- 



EDUCATION. 83 

gestion of mere theorists. Under that formula four 
hundred millions of men — one third of the human 
race — have found stability for their institutions in 
China. By their public school system they have or- 
ganized their national intellect; by their canal sys- 
tem they have made themselves, though living in a 
climate as diversified as ours, essentially one people. 
The principle on which their political system is thus 
founded has for many thousand years confronted suc- 
cessfully all human variations, and has outlived all 
revolutions. But what is their public education 
compared with what ours might be? what is their 
canal system compared with what our railroads will 
become \ 

Of education I shall have nothing more to say, for 
all intelligent persons concur in the belief that it is 
absolutely necessary to the perpetuity of the Ameri- 
can system. The public value of locomotion is by no 
means so well understood. While legislation has in 
all directions been brought to bear on the protection, 
encouragement, development of the former ; the lat- 
ter, it may be said, has been altogether neglected in a 
national point of view. 

Talleyrand, when speaking of the United States to 
the Emperor Napoleon, made this remark : " It is a 
giant without bones." That was before there were 
any railroads ; but since his day the bones have be- 
gun to grow, and they are bones of iron. 



84 LOCOMOTION. 

Now, since there is an unceasing tendency to the 
modification of the human system by the operation 
of climate, and evils ensue both by a community 
coming into repose, which is politically falling into 
a stagnant condition, and by the antagonisms that 
arise between conterminous communities that have 
thus passed into different states, it is very plain that 
the thing of primary importance to be accomplished 
is, as far as may be possible, to prevent such climate 
actions reaching their fall effect. This can only be 
done by promoting locomotion. 

It is therefore unwise to give legislative encour- 
agement to any thing that may tend to make com- 
munities, or even families, too stationary. Fortunate- 
ly, the intentions of the statesman, in this respect, are 
greatly facilitated by the established usages respect- 
ing the inheritance of property and the incessant 
breaking up of estates. Not less effectual is the sys- 
tem of agriculture, if such it can be called, that we 
pursue — our practice of killing land. A soil that has 
undergone exhaustion of certain of its essential ingre- 
dients, as bone-earth, potash, or the like, can not be 
economically restored. It is much cheaper to aban- 
don the ruined estate and move to the virgin lands 
of the West. That love of the homestead, so charac- 
teristic of the settled populations of Europe, can 
scarcely be said to exist among us. The children 
leave their father's hearth without reluctance, for he 



NECESSITY OE PUBLIC LOCOMOTION. 85 

is perpetually anticipating leaving it himself. It 
might have been feared — perhaps was feared by 
many observant persons — that this loss of local pat- 
riotism wonld imply the loss of national sentiment, 
but the experience of the civil war has shown the in- 
correctness of such a foreboding. The history of the 
world can not furnish a more splendid example of un- 
wavering fortitude, unshrinking self-sacrifice, in vindi- 
cation of national life. The acts of which it has been 
our privilege to be eye-witnesses, will by future gen- 
erations of Americans be pointed to with pride as the 
greatest glory of their history — an incentive in their 
inevitable march to imperial greatness, a firm support 
in their days of trial. 

The customs and usages of American domestic life 
have therefore, to a certain extent, made us a locomo- 
tive people. Not without reason have many foreign 
travelers affirmed that we are essentially a nomadic 
race. It is well for our future that we are so. 

It should be a settled principle of American legis- 
lation to encourage in every possible manner facili- 
ties for intercommunication, to repress in the most 
effectual way any thing that might possibly act as a 
restraint. 

From the results of the policy that has been pur- 
sued in the case of the Post-office system, very valu- 
able suggestions may be gathered. By reducing the 
cost of the transmission of letters and newspapers to 



86 NECESSITY OF PUBLIC LOCOMOTION. 

the smallest possible amount, conspicuous social ad- 
vantages have been gained. The family tie has been 
knit in spite of separation, the public intellect has 
been enlarged by the diffusion of general informa- 
tion. That mental activity which arises from the 
concentration of masses of men in great cities is felt 
sympathetically in the most sparsely peopled and dis- 
tant country places. During the civil war metropoli- 
tan journalism has every where been recognized as a 
living power. 

But it is not enough that there should be free 
movement for thought; free movement for the peo- 
ple themselves is of equal importance. That is the 
true method for combating climate effects — prevent- 
ing communities from falling into Asiatic torpor, and 
contracting senseless antipathies against each other. 
Had the Southern States for the last ten years been 
pervaded by an unceasing stream of Northern travel 
in every direction, the civil war would not have oc- 
curred. 

Experience shows that travel increases as its cost 
diminishes. Whatever, therefore, operates as a tax 
on locomotion, is inconsistent with the highest princi- 
ples of state policy. No community should be per- 
mitted to take advantage of the geographical position 
it may happen to occupy for the purpose of exacting 
a toll for its own profit. Such practices may suit an 
Arab sheikh or other Asiatic chieftain, who levies a 



NECESSITY OF PUBLIC LOCOMOTION. 87 

contribution on the passing caravan, "but is altogether 
inadmissible in a modernized society. A community 
can not perpetrate this act without becoming politic- 
ally debauched and demoralized. It is an offense 
against the highest public interests. 

When the Kail way system was first being devel- 
oped in England, measures were taken to give to the 
government an eventual and thorough control over 
it. Already in that country it is agitated to consum- 
mate those measures by the State assuming the pro- 
prietorship of the roads, equalizing their rates of 
charge, and reducing those rates to a minimum. 
There can be no doubt that such a consummation 
would produce very powerful social effects. In its 
direction it would act in the same manner that the 
changes in the postal system have clone, those social 
effects being all of an advantageous kind. But En- 
gland, her comparatively restricted geographical ex- 
tent being considered, is not pressed by those climate 
considerations that are of such paramount importance 
in America. Her reasons for action in the matter are 
therefore, it may be said, of a very subordinate kind 
compared with those that concern us. In America, 
transportation at the lowest possible cost assumes the 
attitude of an affair of the highest state necessity. 

In view of that state necessity, all local and indi- 
vidual interests must be compelled to give way. 
How far in future years, when these problems are 



88 EFFECTS OF LOCOMOTION. 

publicly better understood than at present, it may be 
found politically expedient to give to the general 
government a control, with the intention of carrying 
the principles here indicated into effect, it is needless 
at present to consider. 

Besides the physiological effect of locomotion in 
thus preventing a permanent impress from Climate, 
it has moral consequences of no little value. These 
will be seen if we compare the condition of Europe 
before the Crusades with its condition subsequently. 
Vast hordes of men under a fanatical impulse were 
precipitated upon the Holy Land. Coming indis- 
criminately from all classes of communities that were 
scarcely elevated above barbarism, the Crusaders 
were suddenly brought in contact with people in- 
habiting countries that for ages had been the seats 
of civilization. Their ideas were not only enlarged, 
but their very style of thinking was changed. Who- 
ever escaped the perils of these religious enterprises 
became, on his return to his native place, an influen- 
tial and authoritative teacher. There was a weaken- 
ing of the force of those maxims that heretofore had 
been a guide, society relieving itself of the stress of 
former modes of thought. It may be doubted wheth- 
er that great religious movement known as the Ref- 
ormation would have been possible had it not been 
for the occurrence of the Crusades, the precipitation 
of whatever there was enterprising in Europe upon 



CHANGES THROUGH MERCANTILE ACTIVITY. 89 

Asia. If they did no more, they certainly accelerated 
its occurrence by several hundred years. 

In like manner, the discovery of America by Colum- 
bus, the doubling of the Cape by De Gama, and the 
circumnavigation of the world by Magellan, through 
the prodigious military and mercantile activity they 
generated, led to equally important results. Trade, 
which until then had been chiefly overland or terres- 
trial, became maritime, a change important in the 
highest degree, since it eventually gave rise to the 
prodigious development of manufacturing industry. 
Heavy masses of goods can never be transported by 
caravans, though they can easily in ships. The geo- 
graphical value of countries was changed. Egypt, 
for instance, lost her position. The commercial ar- 
rangements of Europe were completely dislocated. 
Venice and Genoa were deprived of their mercantile 
supremacy; prosperity left the Italian towns; the 
commercial monopolies so long in the hands of the 
European Jews were broken down. These were the 
first steps of that maritime development soon exhib- 
ited by Western Europe. And since commercial 
prosperity is forthwith followed by the production 
of men and the concentration of wealth, and, more- 
over, implies an energetic intellectual condition, it ap- 
peared before long that the three centres of popula- 
tion, of wealth, and of intellect were shifting west- 
wardly. The front of Europe was suddenly changed ; 



90 NECESSITY OF MOTION TO LIFE. 

the British Islands, hitherto in a sequestered and ec- 
centric position, were all at once put in the van of 
the new movement. Wealth poured in, and markets 
were sought for all over the globe. The separate 
principalities and kingdoms were taught to act in 
unison, and the idea of Europe — united Europe — was 
made manifest. 

Life, whether social or personal, is a condition im- 
plying movement. Its energy is in proportion to the 
activity with which interior motions are made. In 
the animal body the blood circulates through every 
part, here carrying away worn-out and wasted mate- 
rial, there presenting new substances to accomplish 
needful repairs. If one region be too hot, the ever- 
flowing blood bears away with it the excess of tem- 
perature ; if another be too cold, the blood imparts to 
it some of its own warmth. In this manner there is 
a perpetual equalization of differences; a continual 
restoration of structure. Particles that are in excess 
at one point are dissolved, and carried to others 
where they may be of more use. 

For the healthy condition of the social system an 
unceasing movement is also needed. There is an 
ennui into which a nation may fall. Hence the in- 
junction — move, if it only be for the sake of moving 
— really conveys a practical good, and in this sense 
motion may be looked upon not only as a means, but 
also as an end. 



NATIONAL INTERIOE MOTION. 91 

Now, when we consider the position of the Ameri- 
can continent — its Atlantic front looking upon Eu- 
rope, its Pacific front looking upon Asia ; when we 
reflect how much Nature has clone for it in the won- 
derful river system she has bestowed, and how va- 
ried are the mineral and agricultural products it 
yields, it would seem as if we should be constrained 
by circumstances to carry out spontaneously in prac- 
tical life the abstract suggestions of policy. A coun- 
try that stands at the head of all others in its pro- 
ducing power must of necessity continually increase 
its interior means of motion. Great undertakings, 
such as the construction of the Pacific Railroad, press- 
ed into existence by commercial motives and fostered 
for military reasons, will indirectly accomplish polit- 
ical objects not yielding in importance to those that 
are obvious and avowed. 

A few years more, and the influence of the Great 
Republic will resistlessly extend in a direction that 
will lead to surprising results. So importunate and 
increasing is the demand for human labor, so tempt- 
ing its remuneration, so productive its use, that those 
stagnant Asiatic tribes to which our attention has in 
some of these pages been directed, can not fail to be 
affected. The stream of Chinese emigration already 
setting into California is but the precursor of the 
flood that is to come. Here are the fields, there are 
the men. The dominant Power on the Pacific Ocean 



92 POSITION OF THE AMERICAN REPUBLIC. 

must necessarily exert a controlling influence in the 
affairs of Asia. 

The Roman Empire is regarded, perhaps not un- 
justly, as the most imposing of all human political 
creations. Italy extended her rule across the eastern 
and western basins of the Mediterranean Sea, from 
the confines of Parthia to Spain. A similar central 
but far grander position is occupied by the American 
continent. The partitions of an interior and narrow 
sea are replaced by the two great oceans. But, since 
History ever repeats itself, the maxims that guided 
the policy of Rome in her advance to sovereignty are 
not without application here. Her mistakes may be 
monitions to us. 

A great, a homogeneous, and yet an active peojxLe, 
having strength and security in its political institu- 
tions, may look forward {o a career of glory. It may, 
without offense, seek to render its life memorable in 
the annals of the human race. 



CHAPTER II 

OE" THE EFFECTS OF EMIGEATION. 

Admitting the correctness of the division of Society into three 
grades, as established by Machiavelli, the effect arising from. 
the emigration of each of those grades is considered, and il- 
lustrations from the history of Spain and England examined. 
The extinction of the Romans and diffusion of the Arabs are 
traced to their physiological causes. 

The political consequences of immigration are illustrated by the 
establishment of the Cotton manufacture in Europe and Negro 
slavery in America. 

T/ie ante -historic settlement of Europe by immigrants from 
Asia, as determined by the modern methods of linguistic re- 
search, is next considered, the laics of Population explained 
in connection ihereioith, and the necessity of material to mor- 
al changes suggested. 

Machiavelli 's principles and the foregoing results are then ap- 
plied to the United States — 1st. European immigration in the 
North; 2d. Interned emigration to the West ; 3d. Prospective 
emigration to the South / 4th. Asiatic immigration to the Pa- 
cific States. The evils contingent on the spread of Polygamy,- 
and the general effects of all these movements on the loealth 
and grandeur of the Republic, are shown. 

Peessuee at home and inducement abroad perpet- 
ually incite men to leave their native country and 
settle in foreign lands. 

In considering the effect of such emigrations, we 
must bear in mind the statement of Machiavelli, that 



94 PRINCIPLES OF EMIGRATION. 

in every great society there are necessarily three or- 
ders of men— a superior order, who understand things 
through their own unassisted mental powers ; an in- 
termediate order, who understand things when they 
are explained to them ; a lower order, who do not un- 
derstand at all. Of the first, it may be added that 
they are limited in number, but dominant in intelli- 
gence ; of the second, that in modern countries having 
free journalism they fall under its influence, the man 
of this grade adopting the opinions of his accustomed 
newspaper, and unconsciously retailing them as his 
own ; of the third, which is by far the most numer- 
ous, its members pass through life in an intellectual 
monotonous slumber — they think in monosyllables. 

Now, the political effect of emigrations depends 
upon this condition — from which of those three or- 
ders has the emigrating mass issued ? We detect the 
guiding principle at a glance. If the drain has been 
from the lower or laboring class, the consequent re- 
sult may not amount to much, for the diminution of 
•that class is capable of quick repair. The self-multi- 
plying force of an old society is, as we shall shortly 
find, greater than the number realized, which is kept 
down by resting influences; and just as the atmos- 
phere will press into an exhausted space, so will that 
unsatisfied, that restrained power of muh^plication 
quickly fill up the vacancy that has been made. 

On the other hand, should the migrating body 



PRINCIPLES OF EMIGRATION. 95 

have diminished seriously the number of the highest 
class, the result is a far more important, a far more 
permanent affair. A loss of the direct influence of 
these men is no inconsiderable thing ; for, no matter 
what may be the form of government the affected 
community may live under, they will and do control 
public thought. Still more, Society has no means of 
recruiting at its pleasure the wasted ranks of this 
class. Such individuals come at limited intervals, 
and only here and there. 

History furnishes us with many instructive in- 
stances as evidences of these truths. 

The discovery of America by Columbus completed 
that wonderful change in Europe which had been be- 
gun by the Crusades. After the German movements 
that brought the Roman Empire to an end had term- 
inated, the lower strata of population fell into a 
comparatively quiescent state. From this condition 
they had not been sensibly disturbed by the political 
events of the reign of Charlemagne. The Holy Wars 
may, however, without exaggeration, be said to have 
precipitated all Europe upon Asia. A very great 
intellectual change in the whole continent was the 
result. 

The Crusading outrush to the East was followed 
on the discovery of America by an outrush of ad- 
venturers across the Atlantic to the West. Relig- 
ious sentiment was superseded by avarice. There 



96 SPANISH EMIGRATION. 

was not a people in Europe who did not become in- 
volved. As might be expected from her position, 
Spain was profoundly implicated in all her social 
ranks. Her men of influence in civil life, in military 
life, in ecclesiastical life, all emigrated across the 
ocean. The thirst for gold was too strong for even 
the pride of family. A paradise of unbounded sen- 
sual enjoyment in this life, riches exceeding whatever 
the wildest dreams of fanatical alchemists had ever 
suggested — a realized El Dorado — these were tempt- 
ations that the hot Spanish blood could not resist. 
The melancholy Peruvian Inca, whose brow was 
adorned with a diadem of scarlet - tasseled fringe, 
when he stretched out his finger on his prison wall, 
and promised to give vessels of gold to that height 
if they would restore him to liberty, only added to 
the fierce avarice of his tormentors. 

What Spain did on this continent can never be 
too often related — it ought never to be forgotten. 
She acted with an appalling atrocity to those In- 
dians, as though they did not belong to the human 
race. Their lands and goods were taken from them 
by apostolic authority. Their persons were next 
seized under the text that the heathen are given as 
an inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth 
for a possession. It was one unspeakable outrage, 
one unutterable ruin, without discrimination of age 
or sex. They who died not under the lash in a trop- 



SPANISH EMIGRATION. 97 

ical sun, died in the darkness of the mine. From se- 
questered sand-banks, where the red flamingo fishes 
in the gray of the morning — from fever-stricken man- 
grove thickets and the gloom of impenetrable forests 
— from hiding-places in the clefts of rocks and the 
solitude of invisible caves — from the eternal snows 
of the Andes, where there was no witness but the 
all-seeing ^un, there went up to God a cry of human 
despair. By millions upon millions, whole races 
and nations t were remorselessly cut off. The Bishop 
of Chiapa affirms that more than fifteen millions were 
exterminated in his time. From Mexico and Peru a 
civilization that might have instructed Europe was 
crushed out. 

The crime of Spain became her punishment. Look 
at her present state ! Where is all that enterprise, 
that energy, that intelligence, which made her the 
leading nation of Europe? Lost in the wilds of 
America, swamped in Indian blood. Has she found 
it possible to recruit that true intellectual aristocracy 
she lost ? The emigration of her best and bravest 
wrought her irreparable ruin. The Mexican and 
Peruvian have had their revenge. There lies the de- 
teriorated country utterly past cure. 

In Europe there is another nation that from our 
present point of view likewise claims our attention. 
The English have peopled by emigration, within 
three centuries, very large portions of the surface of 

G 



98 ENGLISH EMIGRATION. 

the earth. The drain on that population has been, 
for the most part, from the second and third classes, 
the first having been implicated in it but to an insig- 
nificant extent. This remark applies even to the ex- 
treme case of India, a country that might be sup- 
posed to offer very great temptations. 

As respects the colonization of North America and 
Australia, together with the less important points, as 
South Africa and New Zealand, there was but little 
inducement for those who prefer a life of learned 
ease, or who seek by speedy methods social distinc- 
tion. The work to be accomplished was the hard 
conquest of Nature, the removing of forests, extract- 
ing the fruits of the earth, founding of cities, estab- 
lishment of trade. On the other hand, in the parent 
country there was an ancient and firmly seated aris- 
tocracy, an established church with great endow- 
ments, a law of primogeniture, and the not difficult 
attainment of eminent distinction by approved tal- 
ent. In a double manner, then, these circumstances 
tended to restrain the first class from participating in 
the movement ; and a singular benefit w T as undoubt- 
edly derived, as we see in the result, for the intrinsic 
strength of that nation has, beyond question, from 
these emigrations suffered no decline. 

In certain particulars English Emigration resem- 
bles the Emigrations from Ancient Greece. Both 
cases present a restricted territory as the immediate 



MEDITERRANEAN EMIGRATION. 99 

inciting cause, and a tendency to colonization as the 
form. On the shores of the Mediterranean and 
Black Seas, from Sinope to Saguntum, were scat- 
tered affiliated settlements. These probably were 
founded on the general principles first adopted by 
Tyre, a city that led the way in the organization of 
European, Asiatic, and North African commerce. 
The wealth accumulated by some of these colonial 
towns led to such habits of luxury as to excite the 
wonder of antiquity, and actually to become proverb- 
ial. The debaucheries and dissipation of the Syba- 
rites were sustained by their lucrative commerce. 
This intercolonial trade was chiefly for slaves, min- 
eral products, articles of manufacture, tin, bronze, oil, 
amber, dyed goods, and worked metals. Position or 
accident made particular towns the chief marts for 
special commodities. Thus, Delos was the great de- 
pot for slaves. It is affirmed that as many as ten 
thousand were sold there in a single day. Notwith- 
standing their wealth, none of the Grecian colonies 
attained the political power of the greatest of the 
Tyrian colonies, Carthage, which maintained for many 
years and through many wars a nearly evenly bal- 
anced military power with Rome itself. 

The intrinsic weakness of such colonial systems is 
shown by the fate of those of Tyre and Greece. Both 
were ruined by the policy of Alexander the Great. 
Though the former city had suffered severely in her 



100 TYRE AND ALEXANDRIA. 

contests with the Babylonian Empire, and Old Tyre 
had been destroyed after a siege of thirteen years 
by a Babylonian king, her site being made " as bare 
as the top of a rock on which the fisherman spreads 
his nets," and " the isles of the sea were troubled at 
her departure," the new City had succeeded to much 
of the commercial prosperity of the Old. It was not 
from any vindictive spirit, but because he discerned 
plainly the political power derived through its posi- 
tion, that Alexander resolved on the utter destruc- 
tion of the place. He took it, after a siege of seven 
months, by building a mole from the main land to 
the island on which the town stood. Immediately 
after the assault, in which a vast multitude of its de- 
fenders fell, two thousand of the inhabitants were 
crucified. With the fall of Tyre the domination of 
Asia as a Mediterranean power came to an end, and 
with the foundation of Alexandria came the commer- 
cial ruin of Greece. 

It is singular how completely these prosperous co- 
lonial settlements, with the single exception of Car- 
thage, disappeared politically on the extinction of 
their commercial centres. Such establishments can 
never be a source of power to the mother country. 
If she relies upon them, they will fail her in her hour 
of need. Founded for the sake of gain, a habit of 
greed grows upon them — so much that they become 
unwilling to bear sacrifices, even though obviously 
for their own good. 



AMERICAN IMMIGRATION. 101 

Wliat Tyre and Greece were in the Mediterranean 
Sea, which, was almost the world to them, England 
has been on the greater theatre of the globe. She 
has founded by emigration colonies in North Ameri- 
ca, the West Indies, South Africa, Australia, New 
Zealand, India. In forty -three years, counting from 
1815, the close of her wars with France, she sent 
forth about four and a half millions of souls. 

Though the intention of the English in these move- 
ments has chiefly been the founding of colonies, the 
motive has varied at different times. In the case of 
that which events have proved to have been by far 
the most important of them all — the Puritan emigra- 
tion — it was religious sentiment. 

For many years the European current of emigra- 
tion to the United States was comparatively feeble. 
It was mainly derived from England, Ireland, Scot- 
land, and Germany, and continued at a nearly uni- 
form annual rate from the American Revolution un- 
til about 1806. From 1784 to 1794 the yearly rate 
was only about 4000. In the latter year it rose to 
10,000, but never recovered that point again until 
1817. This falling off was due to the European wars, 
which not only created an urgent demand for men, 
both for land and sea service, but also to the enforce- 
ment of the principle at that time insisted upon by 
the English government, that a subject could never 
throw off his allegiance — " once a subject, always a 



102 AMERICAN IMMIGRATION. 

subject." Experience had led to the conclusion that 
not much reliance could be placed on the affection a 
man may spontaneously feel for the country of his 
birth, an affection arising from the recollections of 
early life. 

In 1817, when the fear of English impressment 
had passed away, the emigration to the United States 
rose to 22,240. In this aggregate there were included 
many native-born Americans, who had, through the 
accidents of the war, been detained in Europe, and 
were now returning. Due allowance made for this, 
the sudden impetus may be traced to the declining 
demand for men for military and naval purposes, the 
great derangement in the pursuits of the working 
classes as a state of war was exchanged for a state 
of peace, and the financial disturbances which were 
occurring or impending. 

The current now steadily gathered force. In 36J 
years, ending December 31st, 1855, the United States 
received nearly four millions and a quarter of immi- 
grants. Among them are found 



1,348,682 British. 
1,206,087 Germans. 
207,492 English. 



747,930 Irish. 

34,599 Scotch. 
188,725 French. 



Under the title " British," in this table, are included 
English, Scotch, and Irish ; their relative proportions 
can not now be ascertained. Competent authorities 



AMERICAN IMMIGRATION. 103 

have, however, Ibeen led to the conclusion that of 
these at least one million were from Ireland. This 
would make the total Irish immigration for that pe- 
riod 1,747,930. 

From the best estimates now accessible, it appears 
that the total immigration in the United States, since 
the Revolution to the close of 1855, has been nearly 
four and a half millions : 

Immigrants up to Sept. 30th, 1819 . 250,000 
" " Dec. 31st, 1855 . 4,212,624 

4,462,624 

In a general manner, it may therefore be affirmed 
that the United States have gained as much from Eu- 
rope by immigration, as Great Britain has lost from 
her domestic population by emigration. At the com- 
mencement of the civil war the number did not differ 
much from five millions. 

It might be supposed that the English emigration, 
as was the case with the Greek, originated mainly 
from over-population at home, but to this cause must 
unquestionably be added a willing disposition to re^ 
sort to expatriation. If these movements have been 
promoted in the British Islands by the facilities aris- 
ing from the same language being spoken in Ameri- 
ca, that motive will not apply to the case of Germany 
as it stands in comparison with that of France. The 
German immigration has been nearly seven fold that 
of France. It has long been remarked that the shep- 



104 TRIBAL AND INDIVIDUAL EMIGRATION. 

herd population, which in ancient times reached from 
the Baltic to China, was perpetually occupied in war- 
like migrations, readily uniting itself under chieftains 
to make incessant attacks on the Asiatic empires, and 
eventually accomplishing the destruction of the Ko- 
man. It kept every thing in a disturbed state. Not 
until Central Europe became engaged in other pur- 
suits did these commotions cease. 

The essential difference between ancient and mod- 
ern migrations -consists in this, that the former were 
tribal, the latter individual, and, indeed, continually 
becoming more and more exclusively so. A tribe 
forcing itself into the seats of its neighbor can only 
accomplish its purpose by violence, which necessarily 
provokes resistance. The movements of the Goths, 
the Huns, the Magyars, the Turks, the Tartars, are 
cases in point; but where the movement is individ- 
ual, the intruder is quietly and imperceptibly melted 
down in the population among whom he has come. 

But, though tribal emigration has thus declined 
into individual, the races that were expansive in the 
ancient times still continue to be so. In the case of 
emigration to the United States, the obstruction aris- 
ing from difference of language applied quite as much 
to the Germans as to the French. Admitting the 
great drain there had been upon the latter through 
their revolutionary and imperial wars, there were 
certainly as great temptations for them in Canada, 



CHANGES BY EMIGRATION. 105 

as there were for the former in the Union. The 
Teutons and Saxons have never lost their wandering 
propensity, though, with the progress of civilization, 
which has imparted safety and rapidity to individual 
locomotion, the manner of satisfying it has changed. 

This change from tribal to individual emigration 
tends to restrict the movement to the third social 
grade. It is by that class that domestic pressure 
and foreign inducement are most powerfully felt; 
and hence, though the losses of Great Britain have 
been numerically so great, her intrinsic strength, as 
already remarked, has suffered no decline. 

The transplantation of men can not be accomplish- 
ed without physiological modifications ensuing. I 
may now indicate, in a general manner, the princi- 
ples governing those modifications. 

When, from its original seat, a people is suddenly 
transposed to some new abode, in which the climate, 
the seasons, the aspect of Nature are altogether dif- 
ferent, it spontaneously commences in all its parts a 
movement to come into harmony with the new con- 
ditions — a movement of a secular nature, and imply- 
ing the consumption of many generations for its ac- 
complishment. During such a period of transmuta- 
tion there is, of course, an increased waste of life, a 
risk, indeed, of total disappearance or national death ; 
but, the change once completed, the requisite corre- 



106 CHANGE BY BLOOD-ADMIXTURE. 

spondence once attained, things go forward again in 
an orderly manner on the basis of the new modifica- 
tion that has been assumed. When the change to 
be accomplished is very profound, involving exten- 
sive anatomical alterations, not merely in the appear- 
ance of the skin, but even in the structure of the 
skull, long periods of time are undoubtedly required, 
and many generations of individuals are consumed. 

Or, by interior disturbance, particularly by blood 
admixture, with more rapidity may a national type 
be affected, the result plainly depending on the ex- 
tent to which admixture has taken place. This is a 
disturbance capable of mathematical computation. 
If the blood admixture is only of limited amount 
and transient in its application, its effect will sensi- 
bly disappear in no very long period of time, though 
never, perhaps, in absolute reality. This accords 
with the observation of philosophical historians, who 
agree in the conclusion that a small tribe intermin- 
gling w T ith a larger one will only disturb it in a tem- 
porary manner, and after the course of a few years 
the effect will cease to be perceptible. The incoming 
stream not only brings its physical peculiarities, but 
its mental peculiarities too. Its intrinsic force is, 
however, very far from being as great as might have 
been anticipated, for its own condition, through cli- 
mate, is about to change ; it has not, therefore, that 
fixity of purpose and resolution that it possessed in 



NATIONAL HOMOGENEOUSNESS. 107 

its native seat. The tendency to homogeneousness 
is all the time felt. It is as if a few drops of water 
were put into a tumbler of wine, and the water itself 
gradually turning into wine. In the first moments 
the admixture might be apparent enough, but it 
would become indistinguishable at last. 

Moreover, as the invaded community gradually 
grows or expands, the same intrusive volume is of 
relatively less and less effect. 

National homogeneousness is thus obviously se- 
cured by the operation of two distinct agencies — the 
first, gradual but inevitable dilution ; the second, mo- 
tion to come into harmony with the external natural 
state. The two conspire in their effects. 

Homogeneousness in a nation makes it conserva- 
tive, and secures its internal stability by producing a 
common direction of thought; for though, of neces- 
sity, the different orders of population occupy them- 
selves mentally with different things, it does not fol- 
low but that the modes of thinking of all may be 
alike. Historians have long remarked how striking- 
ly this holds good in the old empires of Asia ; and 
that, though monarchs and their ministers may be 
punished during political troubles, it never occurs to 
any one that the system is wrong, or that it needs 
the slightest change. On the contrary, in Europe 
the different orders think differently ; there is an in- 
trinsic difference between the conclusions of the in- 



108 BLOOD-ADMIXTURE AFFECTS THOUGHT. ^ 

telligent few and the fetichisnis of the innumerable 
illiterate mass. This is the cause that on that con- 
tinent government has become so difficult, and that 
there is nothing certain as to its right principles, and 
no unanimity in religion. 

The foregoing principles are illustrated in a strik- 
ing manner by the history of the Romans. From a 
central nucleus in Italy they spread all round the 
Mediterranean Sea. Greek, Asiatic, Syrian, Egyptian, 
African, Spaniard, Gaul, Briton, were all conquered 
and contaminated by them, and contaminated them 
in return. But how stood the numerical relation? 
What was the blood of Italy transfused into all that 
foreign blood ? and what, in the nature of the thing, 
must become of the Romans? They were literally 
dissolved and lost in the conterminous races. With 
them went all their ideas, all their institutions. 
Their political forms vanished — their religious forms, 
their paganism, disappeared. On the contrary, the 
thoughts of the conquered people vanquished the 
thoughts of the Romans. In the most important of 
all instances that can be adduced, we see how true 
this is. Christianity did not originate in Imperial 
Rome ; it was not imposed by her on the provinces. 
It originated in the provinces, and was by them 
forced on the reluctant arbi tress of the world. 

In this mortal adulteration of the true Roman 
blood there was one particular influence deserving 



SOCIAL CORRUPTION IN ROME. 109 

our thoughtful attention. It operated in the very 
heart of the Empire — in Italy itself. Incredible dis- 
sipation, the offspring of enormous riches, sapped so- 
ciety. In the reigns of the first Emperors it was 
looked upon as a singular felicity to have no family. 
I can here only touch lightly on that state of things ; 
but whoever will reflect on the subject will see that 
the matter must have pressed severely on the state 
before law after law, each more stringent than its 
predecessor, was enacted to correct the evil. The 
thing went on from bad to worse, until slave concu- 
binage was almost universal. No language can de- 
scribe the state of Rome after the civil wars. The 
accumulation of power and wealth gave rise to a 
universal depravity. Law ceased to be of any value. 
A suitor must deposit a bribe before a trial could be 
had. The social fabric was a festering mass of rot- 
tenness. The people had become a populace, the 
aristocracy was demoniac, the city w^as a hell. No 
crime that the annals of human wickedness can show 
was left unperpetrated. Remorseless murders; the 
betrayal of husbands, wives, friends ; poisoning re- 
duced to a system. Legal marriage had almost 
ceased. The younger women had become so incred- 
ibly extravagant that the men affirmed they could 
not support them. In the time of Caesar it was nec- 
essary for the government to interfere, and actually 
put a premium on marriage. He gave rewards to 



HO SOCIAL CORRUPTION IN ROME. 

women who had many children; prohibited those 
who were under forty -five years of age, and who had 
no children, from wearing jewels and riding in litters, 
hoping by such social disabilities to correct the evil. 
Finding that this was of no avail, Augustus, in view 
of the general avoidance of legal marriage and resort 
to concubinage with slaves, was compelled to im- 
pose penalties on the unmarried — to enact that they 
should not inherit by will, except from relations. 
Plutarch emphatically stigmatized the condition when 
he wrote, "The Eomans marry to be heirs, and not to 
have heirs." 

Nations can not be permanently modified except 
by principles or actions conspiring with their exist- 
ing tendency. Violence perpetrated upon them pass- 
es away, leaving, perhaps, in a few generations, no 
vestige of itself. Even Victory is conquered by Time. 
The extinction of Races of men is never accomplished 
by Force, but by insidious agencies, that modify the 
men themselves. 

Such was the effect as regards the Roman race. It 
slowly died out in Italy itself; and, particularly after 
the wars of Justinian, the German tribes flowed in to 
fill the void. The splendid architecture, the magnifi- 
cent recollections, the glorious sky, the fields that 
had been so lately a garden — did these forthwith 
raise the intruders to the standard of the departed ? 
Changes in the human race take time. For a thou- 



THE MODERN ITALIAN. HI 

sand years the condition of that population was as 
debased as it is possible for that of a community to 
be. Meanwhile climate and the aspect of nature 
were gradually doing their work, and out of such 
base material the modern Italian arose. 

There is a tendency in a hybrid offspring to ex- 
hibit a preference for that which may be regarded 
as the more honorable of its constituents, and this 
even though the commingling has occurred in a vio- 
lent way, as by conquest. The barbarian invasions 
of Italy had in a few centuries in this manner com- 
pletely amalgamated the remnant of the Roman eth- 
nical element that still remained in the peninsula — 
so completely, that the old manners were gone, the 
old religion supplanted, the language dead. Yet the 
conquering element acknowledged the supremacy of 
the conquered. It willingly forgot its traditions be- 
yond the Danube, and cherished a delusive pride in 
the glory of the great republican times. 

Blood degeneration implies thought degeneration. 
As the great statesman to whom I have already re- 
ferred, himself an Italian, and profoundly appreciating 
these things, observes, Caesar and Pompey had disap- 
peared, John, Matthew, and Peter had come in their 
stead. Barbarized names are the outward and visi- 
ble signs of barbarized ideas. It was nothing more 
than might be expected that, in this mongrel race, 
customs, and language, and even names, should change 



112 ARABIAN EMIGRATION. 

— that rivers, and towns, and men should receive new 
appellations. Nor was it until the Italian population 
had re-established itself in a physiological relation 
with the country that manly thoughts and true con- 
ceptions could be regained. Ideas and dogmas, that 
would not have been tolerated for an instant in the 
pure old homogeneous Roman race, found acceptance 
in this adulterated, this festering mass. 

I will still farther enforce these principles by an il- 
lustration scarcely inferior in weight to that furnish- 
ed by Eome herself. 

Hitherto we have been considering Nations, civil- 
ized and barbarian, who were animated by ideas that 
we may strictly term European. But these princi- 
ples are illustrated with equal emphasis if the com- 
munities under examination are Asiatic. 

When, under Mohammed and his successors, the 
Arabians burst forth from their native seats and car- 
ried their conquering arms into the heart of Asia on 
one side, and to the Atlantic Ocean on the other, so 
rapid was their diffusion, so small their own mass, so 
prodigious the volume of humanity with which they 
mixed, that it might have seemed impossible but that 
an instant fate should overtake them — their con- 
quests ephemeral, themselves vanishing away. But 
the very reverse occurred. For centuries in succes- 
sion, the countries they had conquered they held; 
nay, more, they literally Arabized them. 



EFFECTS OF POLYGAMY. 113 

The explanation of this surprising political result 
turns altogether on the position of the female sex 
among; Asiatics. In barbarous states the woman is 
the slave of the man ; the Asiatic makes her his toy, 
the European his companion. The avarice of the for- 
mer for beauty is replaced in the latter by an avarice 
for wealth. The treasures of the one are placed in a 
harem, those of the other are invested in the public 
funds. 

The natural position of the female sex in this re- 
spect is indicated at once by the relation of numbers. 
In Europe, for every 106 male births there are 100 
female; hence Ave may truly affirm that monogamy 
is the proper condition of our species, and that, apart 
from its social evils, polygamy is an unnatural state. 

But, though this is the scientific conclusion to 
which we must come, no one can deny the prodig- 
ious political power of polygamic institutions. What 
must be the inevitable result when there were single 
families sometimes of nearly two hundred children, 
who were all glorying in their descent from their 
conquering father and speaking his tongue ? Was it 
to be wondered at that tribute in all the vanquished 
countries soon ceased, and that the physiognomy and 
mental constitution of the Arab every where pre- 
vailed I 

To this, the direct effect of polygamy, we must add 
the influence of that most ungallant practice of the 

H 



114 POSITION OF WOMEN IN THE EAST. 

Asiatics, the exclusion of their women from society. 
It cut off effectually what little influence was left. 
We need not believe them when they say that they 
do not do this through jealousy ; nor need we accept 
their defamation, that so deeply implanted in the fe- 
male heart is the love of fashion and novelty, that 
there is no grotesqueness too surprising for women to 
imitate ; that, if unconfined, they produce a continual 
change of customs and an unsettled state ; and that 
any community desiring stability and permanence 
must shut them up. 

That is their shameful slander, that their scandal- 
ous practice. If they do gain their wished-for stag- 
nation, what is the price they pay? — the family. 
The monogamous habit makes the family. It leads 
to the accumulation and transmission of wealth from 
generation to generation in the same house. "With 
this arises a liability to a concentration of power in 
castes, and the use of surnames that perpetuate fam- 
ily interests and family pride. In Europe the ca- 
reer of improvement is in the Society, in Asia it is in 
the Individual. Doubtless, in Asia, there are women 
who can more than rival the bewitching fascinations 
of their European sisters — women of exquisite form 
and of transcendent loveliness. A village in Pal- 
estine was the birthplace of the Madonna! But 
among us there is more than all that — something 
that they can never see, something that is produced 



THE SARACENS IN EUROPE. 115 

by the family and social relation, for it is therein that 
the beautiful qualities of our women shine forth. 
At the close of a long life, checkered with pleasures 
and misfortunes, how often does the aged man with 
emotion confess that, though all the ephemeral ac- 
quaintances and attachments of his career have end- 
ed in disappointment and alienation, the wife of his 
youth is still his friend ! In a world from which 
every thing else seems to be passing away, her affec- 
tion alone is unchanged — true to him in sickness as 
in health, in misfortune as in prosperity, true in the 
hour of death. 

Thus, in the spread of the Arabians, if the sword 
made the conquest, Polygamy secured it. A social 
remodeling in all the subjugated countries took ef- 
fect. There lies the secret of the permanence of the 
Arab and of the disappearance of the Eoman. 

Besides the effects here pointed out, the Moham- 
medan emigration into Europe has left an impression 
so deep as to impart a characteristic feature to mod- 
ern civilized life. To those Orientals we must im- 
pute the immediate origin of the scientific and indus- 
trial pursuits of our own times. Nay, more, their 
ideas and the consequences of their actions, both for 
evil and for good, have tinctured the daily life of 
America. An art introduced by the Arabians into 
Spain was the inciting cause of the great develop- 
ment of the Slave system in the United States — that 



116 MOORISH ART AND SCIENCE. 

system for the sake of which the civil war was pro- 
voked. For, though in one respect the growth and 
manufacture of cotton may be said to "be indigenous 
here, since fabrics of that material were extensively 
used by the Mexicans at the time of the conquest by 
Cortez, it was not the spread of this, but of the Eu- 
ropean cotton industry, that has affected the South- 
ern States so profoundly. 

It is scarcely possible to refer to a more striking 
instance of the impression that may be made by the 
habits of emigrants on the communities in which they 
have resided. The Moors have long ago been re- 
moved from Spain, but the arts they there introduced 
have spread to other countries, and permanently in- 
fluenced their life. 

It has sometimes been asked, not without an air 
of triumph, where are the proofs of our indebtedness 
to the Mohammedans, and especially to the Moorish 
invaders of Spain? It has likewise* 4 been asserted 
that the Saracenic mind never rose above mere com- 
mentatorship upon Greek originals in matters of sci- 
ence, and in matters of art was altogether barren and 
worthless. So far as science is concerned, I have else- 
where shown how untrue and unjust such a state- 
ment is, and that, in reality, the scientific knowledge 
of modern Europe is the offspring of the conquest 
of Spain ; that it was a boon not only received with 
reluctance, but actually resisted with bitterness by 



THE COTTON MANUFACTURE. H7 

our forefathers, because its fundamental principles 
were supposed to be in opposition to their habits of 
thought and interests. And now, as respects indus- 
trial art, in the midst of the miracles in which we 
live, and which, within the last century, has not only 
figuratively, but in reality, revolutionized the face of 
the earth, the same assertion may be made. To the 
Saracens we are indebted for the cotton manufacture. 
Through their influence that art was extended from 
Japan to the Gulf of Guinea, from the Pyrenees to 
the equinoctial line. They spread the use of that 
material which at this day constitutes a chief source 
of the wealth of manufacturing Europe and of agri- 
cultural America. As in the sciences — mathematics, 
astronomy, chemistry, etc. — they have left an indeli- 
ble impression, of which such words as algebra, alma- 
nac, alcohol, and many others that might be mention- 
ed, are the enduring reminiscences, so in this branch 
of industry there are like witnesses : not a few of its 
terms that have been incorporated in our speech are 
of Oriental origin. The word cotton itself is Arabic ; 
muslin is so called from Mosul, a city on the banks 
of the Tigris, where was once the chief seat of its 
manufacture ; calico, from Calicut, in India. The un- 
der-garment worn by ladies passes under a name 
which shows from whom they derived it, for chemise 
is an Arabic word. 

The cotton manufacture was commenced in Spain 



118 THE COTTON MANUFACTUKE. 

by Abderahman III. about A.D. 930, a period during 
which attention seems to have been particularly di- 
rected by the Moors to the improvement of agricul- 
ture and manufactures, while the rest of Europe was 
falling deeper and deeper into barbarism and night. 
The Khalif introduced into the peninsula the sugar- 
cane, rice, the mulberry -tree, with many improve- 
ments in such arts as tanning and the manufacture 
of silk. Cotton was carried into Sicily by the Sara- 
cens on their occupancy of that island, and, indeed, 
from Spain the use of it spread more or less all over 
the north and east of Europe. One of the Moham- 
medan applications of this vegetable product was 
destined to be of the utmost value : it was the inven- 
tion of cotton paper. The real merit of the invention 
of the art of printing lies not, as is commonly sup- 
posed, in the contrivance of the press and types, but 
in the making of paper. The process of multiplying 
impressions by seals and stamps, which is essentially 
a printing process, had been known from the remotest 
antiquity ; but such operations could never be made 
available for the extensive dissemination of knowl- 
edge until something more abundant and cheaper 
than papyrus and parchment was discovered. This 
want was supplied by the Arabian cotton paper. A 
charter of Eoger,king of Sicily, A.D. 1102, is express- 
ly stated to have been written on that substance, and, 
in fact, there are traces of its use somewhat earlier. 



HINDOO COTTON MANUFACTURE. 119 

The Moors also made paper of linen long before it 
was known in any other part of Enrope. 

But, though cotton was resorted to as an article of 
clothing by the Arabs from the earliest times (from 
the Khalif downward they wore dresses of it), there 
was another Oriental nation who greatly excelled 
them in the perfection of its manufacture. Long be- 
fore the Macedonian invasion the Hindoos had prac- 
ticed this art, and to our own times have maintained 
so great an excellence in it, that those familiar with 
the most recent improvements still speak of their 
work with admiration. " It is so beautifully fine, 7 ' 
says one, " that it looks like the work of insects or 
fairies." Another states that he has seen an entire 
dress made of it drawn through a small ring ; that 
the spinners can make threads so fine as to be hardly 
discernible — that you can not feel them with the fin- 
ger ; that when the cloth has been laid on the grass 
to bleach, and the dew has fallen on it, it is actually 
impossible to see it, justifying the designation that 
has been applied to it — a web of woven wind ; or the 
condemnation once passed upon it by some of the 
manufacturers interested in fabrics of a coarser sort, 
that it was " the mere shadow of a commodity." In 
the course of innumerable ages, by the practice of 
this art in successive generations, so exquisite has the 
sense of touch in the Hindoo spinner become, that he 
can extend a single grain of cotton into a yarn twem 



120 HINDOO COTTON MANUFACTURE. 

ty-nine yards in length, or one ponnd into more than 
115 miles. However, it mnst be added that the au- 
tomatic engines of the English factories have excelled 
that tenuity. At the Great Exhibition there was a 
sample answering to 1026 miles. In India, the ma- 
chinery both for spinning and weaving is of the sim- 
plest kind, the personal tact of the operative supply- 
ing every want, and that often under the most disad- 
vantageous circumstances. Beneath a shed or under 
the shade of a tamarind -tree the Hindoo fixes his 
clumsy loom, with every drawback from the oppress- 
iveness or inclemency of the weather. There is in 
the production of this textile fabric something con- 
genial to his habits ; a sedentary life is in correspond- 
ence to the climate, and his personal organization is 
more favorable to delicate tact than to muscular ex- 
ertion. He shows little disposition to avail himself 
of obvious improvements which would greatly short- 
en his labor, preferring to work in the same way that 
his forefathers did. It should nevertheless be remem- 
bered that the spinning-wheel is his invention, and it 
is no insignificant improvement on the old spindle 
and distaff. "With all the disadvantage of this men- 
tal carelessness and immobility, the Mohammedans 
managed to spread the Hindoo cotton manufacture 
into the Chinese Empire ; and it is by no means un- 
interesting to notice, as showing the sameness of hu- 
man nature in all countries, that this intrusion of the 



EUROPEAN COTTON MANUFACTURE. 121 

cotton manufacture was resisted by the silk interest 
among the Chinese upon the same principle and in 
the same way as by the woolen interest in England. 
Indeed, nearly all the European governments, under 
the influence of similar motives, either restricted or 
prohibited the use of cotton goods ; and yet, in spite 
of all such combinations, legislation, and opposition, 
those fabrics have forced their way until they consti- 
tute the chief article of clothing of the human race. 

It is sometimes remarked, as a proof of the inferior- 
ity of the Asiatics, that this important manufacture 
remained among them undeveloped and unimproved 
for more than four thousand years; whereas, when 
the English took it up, they carried it in less than a 
century to so great a degree of perfection, that a man 
could do more work in a day than he had formerly 
clone in a year. Simultaneously other inventions of 
the most momentous interest to civilization were in- 
troduced — the Canal system, the Steam-engine in all 
its forms, stationary and locomotive, high pressure 
and low, Railroads, the development of the Iron man- 
ufacture, and new methods for rendering all kinds of 
machinery more exact in construction and perfect in 
operation. 

But I do not think that this inertness in India and 
this activity in England are to be interpreted in the 
way such writers suppose. Doubtless the position of 
women in the social system of India had no little to 



122 EUROPEAN COTTON MANUFACTURE. 

do with the result. An extensive introduction of 
machinery never fails to touch domestic life. Even 
in England the various riots attending the introduc- 
tion of the manufactures were mainly incited by the 
apprehension that machinery was throwing the op- 
eratives out of work. Extraneous circumstances thus 
not only arrest, but often enough destroy human occu- 
pations. It is upon such principles that we must ex- 
plain the total destruction of this very manufacture 
in Spain after the expulsion of the Moors. The 
Spanish Christian was not inferior to the Spanish 
Mohammedan. Our reflections on the Hindoos for 
their incapacity in these improvements are of about 
as little weight as were those of the woolen weavers 
brought over to England by Edward III. It was 
said that the English knew no more what to do with 
wool than the sheep on whose backs it grew. And 
this was on the eve of their great development of 
that branch of industry. 

To the Saracens we must therefore attribute the 
introduction of cotton and the cotton manufacture 
into Europe. It found its way into England under 
circumstances in many respects interesting. After 
the capture of Antwerp by the Duke of Parma in 
1585, great numbers of workmen fled to England to 
escape the sanguinary persecutions. Among these 
were many cotton artisans, who settled in Manches- 
ter, and were kindly received and patronized by the 



THE FACTORY SYSTEM. 123 

authorities of that town. In the course of the next 
hundred and fifty years the manufacture had become 
firmly established, and a considerable cotton trade 
had arisen with the Levant. In the early part of the 
last century the demand for these goods had become 
so considerable that hand-labor had begun to be in- 
sufficient to satisfy it, and it was necessary to resort 
to machinery. 

In succession there appeared Wyatt's invention for 
spinning by pairs of rollers turning with different 
velocities, Paul's rotary carding engine, Arkwright's 
great improvements, Hargreaves's jenny, Crompton's 
mule, and many other contrivances of singular power 
and beauty. 

By these admirable inventions the cotton manufac- 
ture underwent so great a development as to require 
an entire change in its economical management, and 
hence arose the Factory System. The necessity for 
this was due, at first, partly to the use of water-pow- 
er for driving machinery, mills springing up wherever 
suitable w^ater-power existed ; in part, also, to the ob- 
vious saving of time, trouble, and money when all the 
operations are conducted under one roof and under 
one supervision, instead of being managed, as they 
formerly were, in a disconnected way, in cottages at a 
distance from one another. 

Though these great improvements in spinning had 
taken place, the cotton manufacture could not have 



124. THE FACTORY SYSTEM. 

attained its present surprising extent had it not been 
for the contemporaneous invention of the steam-en- 
gine — contemporaneous, for Watt's first patent was 
taken out in 1769, the same year that Arkwright 
patented spinning by rollers. Watt's improvements 
chiefly consisted in the use of a separate condenser, 
and the replacement of atmospheric pressure by that 
of steam. Still, it was not until 1790 that the steam- 
engine was introduced into factories, and hence it was 
not, as is commonly supposed, the cause of their won- 
derful increase. It came, however, at an opportune 
moment, its use in this application being nearly coin- 
cident with the invention of the dressing machine by 
Badcliffe, and the power-loom by Cartwright. 

In other respects there were many happy incidents. 
If the mechanical department of the cotton manufac- 
ture received great advantages frorn the invention of 
the steam-engine, its chemical department was equal- 
ly favored by the discovery of bleaching by chlorine, 
an application made by Berthollet in 1785, and 
brought into practical use by Watt. To bleach a 
piece of cotton by the action of the air and sun had 
required from six to eight months, and a large sur- 
face of land must be used as bleach-fields. The value 
of land in the vicinity of large towns offered an insu- 
perable obstacle to such uses. Much of the products 
of the British looms was therefore sent over to Hol- 
land to be whitened. The use of dilute sulphuric 



EUROPEAN IMPROVEMENTS. 125 

acid by Dr. Home, of Edinburgh, in the stead of sour 
milk, hitherto employed in the operation, reduced the 
time greatly, but still it required three or four months. 
By chlorine the operation could be completed in the 
course of a few hours, the fibre being perfectly whiten- 
ed, its coloring material so thoroughly destroyed as to 
be altogether incapable of restoration. It was at first 
used as a watery solution, subsequently as chloride 
of lime. Nor were the new chemical operations re- 
stricted to the bleaching of this fabric. Calico print- 
ing, an art practiced many thousand years ago among 
the Egyptians, as described by Pliny, was also per- 
fected. The Arabs had introduced printing by blocks 
of wood, an advance on the Indian operation of paint- 
ing by hand. The great European improvement was 
printing by cylinders, introduced by Bell in 1785. 

As the result of these various inventions, the cot- 
ton manufacture in much less than a century had 
reached such an extension as might almost appear in- 
credible. Mr. Baines, writing in 1833, estimates the 
total annual value of the manufacture at about one 
hundred and fifty millions of dollars ; the number of 
persons supported by it at one and a half million ; 
the length of yarn spun at nearly iive thousand mil- 
lions of miles — sufficient to pass round the earth's 
circumference more than two hundred thousand times 
— sufficient to reach fifty-one times from the earth to 
the sun. "It would encircle the earth's orbit eight 



126 EUROPEAN IMPROVEMENTS. 

and a half times. The wrought fabrics of cotton ex- 
ported in one year would form a girdle for the globe 
passing eleven times round the equator. The re- 
ceipts of the manufacturers and merchants for this 
one production of national industry are equal to two 
thirds the whole public revenue of the kingdom. To 
complete the wonder, this manufacture is the creation 
of the genius of a few humble mechanics. It has 
sprung up from insignificance to its present magni- 
tude within little more than half a century, and it is 
still advancing with a rapidity of increase that defies 
all calculation of what it shall be in future ages." 

But such a vast improvement in this particular 
manufacture necessarily implied other improvements, 
especially in locomotion and the transmission of intel- 
ligence. The peddler's pact, the pack-horse, and the 
cart, became altogether inadequate, and in succession 
were replaced by the canal system of the last century, 
and by the steamboats and railroads of this. The en- 
gineering triumphs of Brindley, whose canals were 
carried across valleys, over or through mountains, 
above rivers, exacted unbounded admiration in his 
own times, and yet they were only the precursors of 
the railroad engineering of ours. As it was, the canal 
system proved to be inadequate to the want, and 
oaken railroads, which had long been used in quar- 
ries and coal-pits with the locomotive invented by 
Murdock in 1784, were destined to supplant them. 



DEVELOPMENT OF MECHANICAL PHILOSOPHY. 127 

It does not fall within my present purpose to relate 
now the locomotion of the whole civilized world was 
revolutionized, not by the act of some great states- 
man, or through the power of some mighty sovereign 
or soldier, but by George Stevenson, once a locomo- 
tive stoker, who, by the invention of the tubular boil- 
er, and the ingenious device of blowing the chimney 
instead of the fire, converted the locomotive of the 
last century, which at its utmost speed could travel 
seven miles an hour, into the locomotive of this, which 
can accomplish seventy. I need not dwell on the 
collateral improvements — the introduction of iron for 
the rails, metallic bridges, tubular bridges, viaducts, 
and all the prodigies of the existing system of rail- 
way engineering. 

It would demand a work of many volumes to fur- 
nish a full and satisfactory description of the indus- 
trial improvements of the last century ; those we 
have been considering are, however, quite sufficient 
to give us a clear appreciation of the direction in 
which, during that period, the movement tended, and 
the extent to which it advanced. All that was thus 
taking place was the necessary result of the material 
philosophy of the preceding age ; the carrying into 
practice the mechanical ideas introduced by the 
schools of Galileo and Newton, and these were the 
direct descendants of the Spanish Mohammedans; 
for the discoveries of those philosophers had not 



128 DEVELOPMENT OF MECHANICAL PHILOSOPHY. 

only been popularized and brought down to the com- 
mon apprehension, but a growing taste for such pur- 
suits had very generally arisen. We see this in the 
many modifications of standard experiments in nat- 
ural philosophy, as those connected with the air- 
pump, and interesting or amusing applications of elec- 
tricity. The books of those times are full of interest- 
ing instances of the kind, some of which are still em- 
ployed in our lecture-rooms, or are retained in our 
elementary works. Such a taste for experimental ar- 
rangements and mechanical contrivances was of course 
powerfully invigorated when there was added an ex- 
pectation of gaining thereby immense wealth. It 
was the same principle which had formerly offered 
an incentive to the alchemists, now, however, direct- 
ed to objects more easily comprehended, and occupy- 
ing itself with principles readily understood. If we 
were to record all the ingenious contrivances origina- 
ting among men of humble station and means during 
the last century for the purpose of solving one me- 
chanical problem — that of the perpetual motion — 
they would form quite a considerable volume. When 
such tastes had become common, it was not at all 
surprising that they should be directed to ordinary 
objects or the operations of daily life, and that an in- 
genious cottager, who supported his family by spin- 
ning, should turn his talent to account by inventing 
a machine with which one person could spin eight or 



POLITICAL RESULTS OF MACHINERY. 129 

ten threads at a time instead of one, as by the old- 
fashioned, time-honored spinning-wheel. 

Moreover, when it appeared, from the case of Ark- 
wright and others, that success in this particular di- 
rection was the high road to wealth, public consid- 
eration, and honor, the realization of riches greater 
than the wildest tales of the alchemists had ever fa- 
bled, an impetus was given, arising from the strongest 
passion which can animate man. It signified noth- 
ing if of the projectors and inventors ninety-nine out 
of a hundred miserably failed; the splendid success 
of the hundredth was encouragement enough, and 
thus from year to year the number of inventions and 
inventors kept on perpetually increasing, no human 
pursuit, no object of human interest escaping, and so 
it continues to our own time. 

In this intellectual activity lay the essential prog- 
ress of the last century. Connected with it there 
were certain collateral incidents of no little signifi- 
cance. For the first time in her history, overpopula- 
tion began to be heard of in England. Even at a 
period much later, the bearing of these things was al- 
together misunderstood by men of great intellectual 
powers and of eminent position. Comparing France 
with England in the struggle in which he was en- 
gaged, Napoleon said, " We must overpower her in 
the end, for we have a vastly greater population." 
He overlooked the fact, which at last settled the con- 

- I 



130 POLITICAL RESULTS OF MACHINERY. 

test, that her steam-engines were representing at that 
moment a population of thirty additional millions of 
adult men; nay, more, men who consumed nothing 
and produced every thing — men whose only want was 
a little oil and coal, but who could do without food 
and clothing, who were indeed ready to find clothing 
for the whole world, who could labor night and day, 
who required no sleep, and could not be fatigued. 
It was not the armies at Waterloo, but these iron 
men whom he so strangely overlooked in his calcula- 
tion, that terminated the contest against him. It was 
through these children of Watt that, after all her tax- 
ation, all her subsidies, all her extravagance, all her 
losses, all her debt, all the inconceivable fatuity of 
her politicians, England came out of that deadly con- 
flict richer, greater, more vigorous and powerful, than 
she had ever been before. 

If mechanical invention has made so profound an 
impression on the national life of Europe, it has done 
the same in America. In the political consequences 
that have ensued from it, Whitney's gin, invented in 
1793, does not yield in importance to the greatest of 
English inventions. The vast development of the 
cotton culture in the Southern States, the increased 
value of negro slave labor, have been its immediate 
results. The product of cotton furnished from those 
states in 1856 was estimated at seven eighths that of 



NEGRO SLAVERY. 131 

the whole world. It amounted in 1860 to more than 
four millions and a half of bales (4,675,770), 

The first African slaves brought to America were 
imported in a Dutch vessel, which landed them at 
Jamestown, in Virginia, in 1620. The cultivation of 
cotton is stated to have been commenced the follow- 
ing year, and from this time the supply of negroes 
continually increased. It is estimated that in the 
course of one hundred and fifty-six years, about three 
hundred thousand slaves had been brought from Af- 
rica. An attempt w^as also made to reduce the na- 
tive Indians to bondage, but it met with but little 
success. They did not submit to their fate with the 
resignation of the blacks. Indeed, at a much later 
period, it was a subject of remark on the plantations 
that the slave families in which there was an infusion 
of Indian blood were characterized by their treacher- 
ous and revengeful spirit. Notwithstanding the prof- 
its arising from their labor, there was a growing dis- 
position to put some restraint on the importation of 
slaves. Several of the colonies remonstrated against 
the trade, but, in opposition to their wishes, the moth- 
er country encouraged it. In 1774 the Continental 
Congress resolved that the importation should be 
stopped; but in 1789, at the formation of the Consti- 
tution, Congress was prohibited from interdicting it 
until 1808, when it was abolished. Ten years previ- 
ously (1798), Georgia had set the example of its pro- 



132 



NEGRO SLAVERY. 



hibition. In 1820, Congress passed a law declaring 
the slave-trade to be piracy. 

From evidence which necessarily must be very im- 
perfect, and therefore unreliable, it has been estimated 
that forty millions of slaves have been taken from 
Africa. The number imported into the American 
colonies up to 1776 has been set down at three hund- 
red thousand. The following table gives the slave 
population from 1790 to 1860 : 



Year. 


Slave Population. 


Year. 


Slave Population. 


1790 


697,879 


1830 


2,009,043 


1800 


893,041 


1840 


2,487,455 


1810 


1,191,364 


1850 


3,204,313 


1820 


1,538,038 


1860 


3,952,801 



From this it appears that the increments are not 
quite equal to what they should have been if meas- 
ured by the standard of the white races on the ad- 
mission of an unrestrained generative action. The 
resistances which have kept the number clown are 
undoubtedly to be sought for in the unfavorable so- 
cial circumstances of Southern slave life. It is to be 
observed that the increase for the decade ending in 
1840 is below the mean. 

The degree of blood contamination undergone by 
the negroes is shown by the number of the mulattoes 
being one ninth that of the blacks. As might be ex- 
pected, the number of free mulattoes is greater than 
that of free blacks. The fact is a testimony to the 
force of instinctive parental feelings. 



NEGRO SLAVERY. 133 

In slave life the proportion of women to men is 
above the European mean. The subjoined table 
shows the number of women to 100 men in the 
places designated: 



New England States . . . 
Southern 


. . . . 101.41 
. . . . 97.04 


Middle 


. . . . 95.88 


Southwestern 


. . . . 91.22 


Northwestern 


. . . . 91.02 


Slaves in Southern .... 
Europe 


. . . . 95.90 
. . . . 94.34 



The mean for the entire white American population 
is about 95.31. The ratio of the female slaves is 
therefore slightly above that of the white women. 
The close approach of the numbers is a very interest- 
ing physiological fact. 

A population of four millions of colored slaves pre- 
sented, at the commencement of the civil war, a so- 
cial element that could not be regarded but with the 
most profound interest. Experience has, however, 
shown how great a change has been impressed upon 
the African character by Climate, Blood-admixture, 
and Ideas. The course these persons have taken 
must be admitted by all impartial observers as in 
the highest degree honorable to them. 

To the foregoing instances, which serve as illustra- 
tions of the general principle we have under consid- 



134 ANCIENT COLONIZATION OF EUKOPE. 

eration, may very profitably be added some of the 
recent discoveries respecting the settlement of the 
European continent by its present dominant race — 
the Indo - European — heretofore briefly referred to 
(page 40). These will afford an opportunity not 
only of showing the precision of such j)re-historic re- 
searches in the hands of modern critics, but also of 
indicating the general principles of the production 
and dissemination of a population, of the stages of 
its progress in civilization, and of the modes by 
which its manner of life may be affected. 

Attempts have often been made to discover the 
primitive histoiy of nations through the nature and 
structure of their languages ; for since to each well- 
marked group of men there appertains a specific form 
of speech, historical relationships may be detected 
through similarities of language, and this both by 
the occurrence of similar roots in their vocabularies 
and by analogies in their grammar. A language, be- 
ing the creation of a group of men, is developed with 
their development, declines with their decay, and dies 
out with their inevitable extinction, unless, as in a 
few cases, such as the Latin, the Pali, the Prakrit, it 
is retained by the learned for the literature it con- 
tains, or, through ecclesiastical policy, is made sa- 
cred. In some respects, therefore, the history of a 
language corresponds to that of the nation by which 
it is spoken; though the general mechanism of all 



ANCIENT COLONIZATION OE EUROPE. 135 

languages must present certain features in common, 
because those features depend on the mechanism of 
the human mind, which is every where of the same 
nature. 

From a critical study of any existing form of 
speech, the more important connections and incidents 
of the people by whom it is spoken may be detected 
— a criticism which must, however, be pursued in a 
very guarded manner, and with a clear perception of 
these accidental, or rather natural coincidences, both 
as respects the names of things and grammatical 
structure. It has often been suggested to Compara- 
tive Philologists that birds in distant countries, which 
could never have had any communication with one an- 
other, sing not only the same note, but also the same 
strain; and that a like thing may be observed of 
cats and dogs, their natural intonations being, how- 
ever, liable to change through the circumstances of 
their life. Thus the wild dog never barks, and when 
the domestic dog relapses into the wild state, it is af- 
firmed that he loses therewith the habit of barking. 

In man, similitudes of expression are liable to oc- 
cur, even in distant places that have never been in 
intercommunication, particularly in the case of such 
sounds as have an instinctive origin, as those of weep- 
ing, laughter, the exclamations of pain, surprise, joy. 
Attention being paid to this, there can be no doubt 
that, by an examination of the language of a people, 



136 ANCIENT COLONIZATION OF EUROPE. 

many facts in its history may be detected, as its in- 
termingling and conflicts with other people, though 
in this respect the impression of languages upon each 
other follows the law observed to hold good in the 
impression of races upon each other, the predominant 
race apparently extinguishing the other, unless the 
action should have been very profound. 

From such evidence, it appears that, long before 
the Historic times, the Indo-Europeans, leaving their 
original country in Asia, migrated through Europe in 
a northwesterly direction, pressing before them the 
aborigines of that continent, who receded until they 
were stopped by the sea, the Finnish and Basque di- 
alects being among the vestiges of that ancient pop- 
ulation. These dialects offer indubitable evidence 
of the small advance in civilization those people had 
made, and of their mediocre intellect. That the 
Basque language was in intermediate times spoken 
from the Alps to the west of Spain, appears to be 
satisfactorily established from the names which places 
and other geographical objects still bear. The im- 
perfect communication kept up between different 
parts of the invading column, as they began to set- 
tle and to multiply in the conquered countries, is 
shown by the diversity of speech, and the introduc- 
tion of new words occurring in regions at no very 
great distance from each other. Thus we may infer 
the chief features of the old belief from the names of 



INDIGENOUS IDEAS. 137 

certain Greek and Latin gods, and their connection 
with those of India. For instance, the God of the 
Sky was called by the Greeks Zeus-pater, by the Lat- 
ins Jupiter, and in the Veda Dyauspiter. A great 
many of the classical legends are also to be found in 
the sacred books of India. 

It may also be remarked that this irruption of the 
Inclo-Europeans took place to the southeast as well as 
to the northwest. Invading Hinclostan, they forced 
the aborigines thereof toward the sea-coast, and even 
compelled them to escape to the islands beyond. Be- 
tween these expelled people and the Australian pop- 
ulation, as well as the aborigines of Europe, some 
singular connections have been traced. 

The religion of the Autochthons of Europe was a 
mere worship of Fetishes, and such deities as they 
had were representatives of natural objects. Proba- 
bly there were no individuals set apart as priests and 
no organized ceremonial. As ever will be the case 
under such circumstances, the base native religion im- 
parted some of its features to its conquering invader, 
the traces of which may not only be recognized in the 
theological systems of Greece and Eome, but have 
even plainly descended to our own times, and that 
not in mere rural superstitions, but extending to 
those of a far more important kind. Of such an ef- 
fect we see a striking example in the case of Ancient 
Egypt, in which the Fetish worship and adoration of 



138 INDIGENOUS IDEAS. 

animals by the native Africans became inseparably 
commingled with the theological conceptions of the 
conquering intruders long before the epoch of Moses, 
and the Pharaonic religion, at once noble and base, 
philosophical and barbarous, was the result. 

There is nothing strange in the perpetuation of 
ideas and modes of thought through many thousand 
years. Their origin is in the very organization of 
men ; for it is through organization that isolated na- 
tions manifest a proclivity to certain mental concep- 
tions and even modes of expression. The negro is 
essentially a Fetish worshiper — a believer in witch- 
craft and in the efficacy of charms. Such ideas and 
the modes of expressing them are found wherever 
that low grade of humanity occurs, occupying a zone 
across all Africa and the vast expanse of the Pacific 
Ocean ; nay, even all round the world, if the black 
populations of America are included ; for these in the 
United States, in the midst of moral, religious, Chris- 
tian communities, are still full of their African ideas. 
I believe that if it were possible for a new race of 
autochthonic negroes to arise, it would inevitably fall 
into these delusions; as certainly as, if there were new 
autochthons of the yellow race, they would spontane- 
ously and inevitably invent a monosyllabic language. 
These are the results of organization. They make 
their appearance wherever the element of that organ- 
ization occurs ; or, to use a common though perhaj:>s 



INDIGENOUS SUPERSTITIONS. 139 

incorrect expression, they descend with the blood. 
The Finnish peasant still has faith in incantations 
and charms ; he believes that there are witches who 
can ride on a stick to the moon, and canse her eclipse 
by their nocturnal invocations; that there are men 
who can still sell to the sailor a favorable wind, and 
to the rustic a refreshing shower. It was this ele- 
ment in the blood of Europe that made the barbarian 
races, after the death of the Latin tongue, such a 
ready receptacle for all kinds of imposture; that 
gave faith in relics and force to fetishisms; that 
turned the minister of the Gospel into a rain-maker 
and wind-raiser, as if the unchangeable and eternal 
laws of nature might be suspended or modified at his 
prayer. It is this which, even in our times, perpetu- 
ates the by no means insignificant traces of these an- 
cient delusions. What is thus planted in the very 
bodily structure, it is hard, if not impossible, alto- 
gether to tear up by the roots. Here and there, 
whenever a favorable moment occurs, it shoots forth 
again. 

Moreover, modern critics have remarked that, as 
nations are thus distinguished by language, so like- 
wise they are by their culture of art, some imitating, 
some inventing, but others being incapable of ex- 
pressing their ideas either by the pencil or in stone. 
The mental physiognomy of a people is thus so com- 
pletely shadowed forth, that from the style of a work 



140 SPONTANEOUS ART. 

we instantly detect its origin. The rigid, motionless 
Egyptian forms betray to us their authors, and this 
irrespective of what might be termed national blun- 
ders, such as the front view of the eye in profiles, and 
the false position of the ear. And as none of the 
surrounding nations ever adopted the language of 
Egypt, so none ever adopted her hieroglyphic sys- 
tem of writing or the peculiarities of her art. Such 
as they were they remained in their birthplace, and 
for thousands of years were perfectly stationary, mak- 
ing not the slightest exhibition of an advance. The 
adjacent Shemitic race possessed no tendency to pic- 
torial expression, their theological systems forbidding 
the making of graven forms, though this injunction 
perhaps arose from their insensibility to the embodi- 
ment of the beautiful ; for it may be doubted wheth- 
er it is possible, when a tendency to pictorial expres- 
sion exists, to restrain it by legal penalties. 

But how different it was with the Indo-Europeans, 
a race which, without hesitation, plunged into the 
depths of metaphysical speculation, and created sys- 
tems of Philosophy false and true. While, among 
the Egyptians, many centuries of that leisure which 
arises from a profound political repose were never il- 
lustrated by the improvement of Art, the apathy of 
Africa perfectly neutralizing all vestiges of the gen- 
ius of that ancient conquering race, who first brought 
civilization to the banks of the Nile — while, also, 



ART IN EUROPE. 141 

among the Shemites, wealth, luxury, a life of ease, 
never led to a spontaneous invention of even the first 
principles of art, very different was it with the Indo- 
Europeans, whose mental proclivities are every where 
manifested in architecture and sculpture. It was, 
however, the Hellenic branch of that race who car- 
ried Art to the highest pitch to which it has ever 
yet attained. Commencing with imperfect begin- 
nings, we see how, among the Greeks, it soon gained 
a great expansive force, rising degree by degree to 
the embodiment of those exquisite conceptions of 
which the sculptures of the Parthenon are the wit- 
nesses, and gaining so intense a vitality as to sur- 
vive Roman conquest and oppression. It was its 
noble peculiarity that, basing itself on a strict an- 
thropomorphism, it carried out with a rigorous con- 
sistency that principle. The remark is perfectly true, 
that while the Oriental artist expressed his ideas of 
strength or swiftness by giving to his statue a mul- 
titude of arms or of limbs, and thereby made a mon- 
ster, the Greek, true to his principle and true to man, 
developed with exquisite tact those human features 
with which such qualities are connected. His statue 
was the ideal conception of whatever there is in man 
essential to strength, or majesty, or beauty, carried 
into material execution, and prefiguring to us the 
forms which we should expect that even God him- 
self would have produced had he been pleased to ren- 



142 ART IN EUROPE. 

der those qualities incarnate. The Greek made no 
monsters, but human forms of transcendent perfec- 
tion. It has been affirmed that this intense idealism 
rendered him incapable of the execution of portraits, 
which are best made by men of a realistic turn. His 
influence in imparting to others his own capability in 
this respect depended on their natural approach to 
his own mental peculiarity. Greek art accompanied 
Greek blood ; and as the latter was eliminated from 
races with whom it had been mingled, and who had 
thereby gained the power of Greek expression, so do 
their works exhibit declining stages, and eventually 
become barbarous and rude. 

Such considerations indicate that from a study of 
the works of art of nations, as from a study of the 
nature and structure of their languages, incidents in 
their history may with certainty be determined ; con- 
clusions which, when they otherwise accord with the 
subsequent career of such people, and in the determ- 
ination of which, if sufficient care and skill have been 
employed, may be received as indubitable, although 
they may relate to pre-historic times. 

Migrating thus from Central Asia, the column of 
invaders destined to give birth to the permanent pop- 
ulation of Europe encountered, in the new seats to 
which they gradually advanced, many diversities of 
climate. In accordance with the principles set forth 
on foregoing pages, they thereby underwent physio- 



CONSEQUENCES OF THE DOCTRINE OF UNITY. 143 

logical changes in complexion and "bodily construc- 
tion. Various national types were thus produced. 

He who accepts the doctrine of the unity of the 
human race — that is, its origination from one primor- 
dial pair — must, in view of the numerous modified 
forms of men now dispersed all over the surface of 
the earth, assign an almost paramount control to cli- 
mate and to modes of life; but the conclusion to 
which he is compelled, if broadly stated, would 
doubtless be very reluctantly received. Its appar- 
ent extravagance may, however, serve to give empha- 
sis to the physiological principle involved; for on 
those principles it would follow that if the life of a 
man could be prolonged through many centuries, and 
he were to occupy it in making a journey over the 
earth from the Arctic to the Antarctic Circle, though 
he might have been perfectly white at first, his com- 
plexion would in succession pass through every de- 
gree of darkness, and by the time he had reached the 
equator, toward the middle of his life, he would be 
perfectly black. Continuing his journey, his color 
would lighten as he proceeded, and on his reaching 
the Antarctic he would become pale again, all these 
changes occurring without any loss of his personal 
identity. Moreover, in this his progress, supposing 
that his mode of life, as regards food and comfort, 
was such as natural conditions suggest, even his 
skull would vary, and with it his intellectual powers. 



144 CONSEQUENCES OF THE DOCTRINE OF UNITY. 

His forehead, reclining at the outset, would undergo 
rectification as lie slowly advanced to more genial 
climes; the facial angle enlarging and reaching a 
maximum at the time of his residence in the tem- 
perate zone, but diminishing again, and his coun- 
tenance becoming baser, as he approached the equa- 
tor, the receding aspect being then for the second 
time assumed. Still passing onward toward the 
south, the facial angle would again enlarge, the skull 
re-rectifying, the intellectual powers expanding, and 
this condition attaining its perfection in the midst 
of the south temperate zone, a relapse ensuing as the 
Antarctic Circle was gained, and there, for the third 
time, the reclining skull being assumed. Nor is this 
all ; for if, in this his career, children were born to 
him, they would be of every shade, of color and of 
every form of skull, for such existing physical pe- 
culiarities are capable of hereditary transmission. I 
have said that this illustration may be supposed ex- 
travagant ; philosophically, however, on the doctrine 
referred to, it is not so ; for what else than such an 
imaginary prolonged individual life is the life of a 
race % and what more has thus occurred to the imag- 
inary traveler than has actually happened to the hu- 
man family ? 

If such are the effects that would ensue to an emi- 
grant slowly passing along a meridional track, the 
case would be quite different if the movement were 



ORIGIN OF EUROPEAN RACES. 145 

along a parallel of latitude. In this direction the va- 
riations of climate are far. less marked, and depend 
much more on geographical than on astronomical 
causes. In emigrations of this kind there is never 
that rapid change of aspect, complexion, and intel- 
lectual power which must occur in the other. Thus, 
though the mean temperature of Europe increases 
from Poland to France, chiefly through the influence 
of the great Atlantic current transferring heat from 
the Gulf of Mexico and tropical ocean, that rise is 
far less than what would be encountered on passing 
through the same distance to the South. By the 
arts of civilization man can much more easily avoid 
the difficulties arising from variations along a paral- 
lel of latitude than those upon a meridian, for the 
simple reason that in that case those variations are 
less. 

The Indo-European emigrating body, thus forcibly 
intruding itself into every region of Europe, not only 
came under the influence of the laws of Climate, but 
also of those laws that determine the increase and 
diminution of Population ; for though, doubtless, the 
birth and death of every human being is, in a relig- 
ious sense, the appointment of Heaven, politically the 
subject has to be regarded from a less dignified point 
of view. Population is determined by Law. 

The population of old countries exhibits secular 
variations, sometimes increasing and sometimes di- 

K 



146 THEORY OF POPULATION. 

minishing. These variations often stand in such a 
connection with political events as to be plainly 
their consequences. The population of the whole 
Roman Empire was prodigiously affected by the in- 
troduction of Christianity ; that of Italy was reduced 
by the wars of Justinian. The north of Africa was 
almost depopulated by the effects of theological quar- 
rels, but it was restored again by the influence of 
Mohammedanism. The introduction of the feudal 
system put a premium on the production of men, and 
accordingly vast numbers appeared. The Crusades 
gave rise to a diminution. From the eleventh to the 
sixteenth century, during five hundred years, the pop- 
ulation of England did not double ; but in fifty years 
after 1790, it doubled in spite of great wars; and 
that this was owing to a local cause is clear, from the 
simultaneously stationary condition of many other 
countries. 

Owing to the diminution of causes which will 
presently be explained as resisting agencies, the an- 
nual increase of the United States in poj3ulation has 
been nearly three times as much as that of Prussia, 
including her gains from the partition of Poland; 
four times as much as that of Russia ; six times that 
of Great Britain; nine times that of Austria; ten 
times that of France. 

Again, the geographical centre of Population is 
liable to displacement. Thus, the centre for Europe 



CENTRE OF POPULATION. 147 

has passed to the north of its ancient position since 
the fall of Paganism. The establishment of the 
Feudal system occasioned one dislocation of it, the 
development of manufacturing industry in the north- 
west of Europe another. 

In the United States the direction of increase by 
population is nearly due west. " The centre of rep- 
resentative population of the Union in 1840 was in 
the northwestern extremity of Virginia. It had trav- 
eled westward since 1790, when it was in Baltimore 
County, Maryland, 182 miles distant, in very nearly 
the same parallel of latitude." 

Montesquieu expresses an opinion which doubtless 
would be strenuously objected to in our day if ad- 
vanced otherwise than facetiously : " A man is worth 
what he will sell for ; in some countries he is worth 
nothing, in others less than nothing." From this it 
would seem to follow, that if production depends 
upon demand, population will be affected by those 
well-known laws holding good in the case of other 
commodities. 

Leaving the consideration of that aspect of the 
case to the ingenuity of the reader, it may be assert- 
ed as being beyond contradiction that not only is 
population determined by physical agencies, but also 
by human legislation or the policy of governments ; 
for governments, by such obvious means as volunta- 
rily engaging in wars, can occasion an absolute dim- 



148 DECREASE OF POPULATION IN ROME. 

inution through, the destruction of life that ensues, 
and they may also, by their course of policy, dimin- 
ish the number of births. They ought to be just as 
much held accountable for restraining the appear- 
ance of individuals as for destroying them after they 
have appeared. 

We can have no better example of the control ex- 
ercised by public policy over population than the 
condition of things in Eome after the Civil Wars. 
The existence of the State was in danger. It has 
been mentioned (page 109) how an indisposition to 
contract matrimony had arisen. Laws were enacted 
to correct the evil, but with so little success that it 
became necessary to resort to other means for in- 
creasing the population. Tacitus, speaking of the 
reign of Claudius, says : " The line of those families 
which were styled by Eomulus the first class of no- 
bility, and by Brutus the second, was almost extinct. 
Even those of more recent date, created in the time 
of Julius Caesar by the Cassian Law, and under Au- 
gustus by the Senian, were well-nigh exhausted." 
Under these circumstances, the Emperor, in a speech 
of remarkable ability, advocated the introduction of 
prominent nobles even into the Senate. " My ances- 
tors, the oldest of whom, Attus Clausus, though of 
Sabine origin, was at once enrolled among Eoman 
citizens and adopted into the patrician rank, furnish 
me with a lesson that I ought to pursue similar meas- 



SPEECH OF THE EMPEROR CLAUDIUS. 149 

ures in directing the affairs of the commonwealth, 
and transfer to Rome every thing that is of pre-emi- 
nent merit wheresoever found. Nor, indeed, am I ig- 
norant that from Alba we had the julii, from Came- 
rium the Coruncanii, and the Portii from Tusculum ; 
and, not to enter into a minute detail of remote trans- 
actions, that from Etruria, Lucania, and all Italy per- 
sons have been incorporated into the Senate. At last 
our city became bounded only by the Alps, so that 
not only separate individuals, but whole states and 
nations, were ingrafted into the Roman name. We 
had solid peace at home, and our arms prospered 
abroad, when the nations beyond the Po were pre- 
sented with the rights of citizens ; and when, under 
pretext of leading out our legions into colonies all 
over the earth, and uniting with them the flower of 
the natives, we recruited our exhausted state. Do 
we regret that the Balbi migrated to us from Spain, 
or men equally illustrious from the Narbon Gaul? 
Their descendants remain yet with us, nor yield to 
us in their love of this our common country. What 
proved the bane of the Spartans and Athenians, 
though potent in arms, was that they treated as 
aliens and refused to unite with the conquered. On 
the other hand, so great was the wisdom of Eomulus 
our founder, that he saw several people his enemies 
and his citizens in one and the same day. Foreign- 
ers have even reigned over us. For magistracies to 



150 SPEECH OF THE EMPEROR CLAUDIUS. 

be intrusted to the children of freemen is no innova 
tion, as many are erroneously persuaded, but a con 
stant practice of the elder people. But, it is urged 
we have had wars with the Senones. Have the Vol 
scians, have the JEquians never engaged us in battle ? 
It is true, our capital has been taken by the Gauls 
but by the Tuscans we have been forced to give host 
ages, and by the Samnites to pass under the yoke 
However, upon a review of all our wars, none will 
be found to have been more speedily concluded than 
that with the Gauls, and from that time uninterrupt- 
ed peace has existed. Identified with us in customs, 
in civil and military accomplishments, and domestic 
alliances, let them rather introduce among us their 
gold and wealth, than enjoy them without our par- 
ticipation. All the institutions, Conscript Fathers, 
which are now venerated as most ancient, were once 
new; the plebeian magistrates were later than the 
patricians, the Latin later than the plebeian; those of 
other nations in Italy came after the Latin ; the pres- 
ent admission of the Gauls will also wax old, and 
what is this day supported by precedents will here- 
after become a precedent." This speech was follow- 
ed by a decree declaring the ^Eduans capable of a 
seat in the Senate. 

The fall of the Roman Empire has been attributed 
to various causes, but, from a consideration of such 
facts as that here presented, I think there can be no 



VAKIATIONS IN THE POPULATION OF ENGLAND. 151 

doubt of the correctness of the conclusion mentioned 
(page 108), that it was due to extinction of the Ro- 
man ethnical element. The special Roman popula- 
tion so rapidly depreciated that the difficulty became 
incurable even by the most energetic legislation. 

National policy, then, exercises a prodigious influ- 
ence on population, though the particular form of 
government may have but little effect. It would not 
have been of the smallest consequence to England, in 
1790, what her form of government might have been 
— republican, oligarchical, or monarchical ; her mech- 
anicians, Watt, Arkwright, Hargreaves, Crompton, 
Cartwright, by their inventions of the steam-engine, 
the spinning -frame, the jenny, the mule, the power- 
loom, the carding-machine, had put her in a position 
to monopolize the markets of the world. Industrial 
interests very quickly became paramount in the state. 
In fifty years she had not only doubled her popula- 
tion, but, as we have said, her machine power had 
become equal to thirty millions of men. In that pe- 
riod she almost quadrupled her wealth, notwithstand- 
ing losses through the most surprising political folly. 
The talent of her inventors more than counterbal- 
anced the ignorance of her statesmen. Her commer- 
cial men, in conquering India, found a compensation 
for the loss of America. Her salvation was due to 
her merchants and machinists, not to her politicians 
and military men. These, had they not been coun- 



152 THEORY OF POPULATION. 

teracted, would inevitably have brought her to ruin ; 
those, in spite of every disadvantage, gave her an in- 
trinsic strength equal to that of the Roman empire 
at its maximum, when its population was one hund- 
red and twenty millions. 

How was it that industrial activity thus developed 
population ? It provided for human support, and in- 
creased the demand for labor. Moreover, during that 
period there was a reduction of mortality by nearly 
one third. 

The general principles involved in determining 
population have long been understood and are very 
simple. The natural instinct which leads to increase, 
and which is the most powerful of human passions, 
is of uniform intensity. Arising in the peculiarities 
of our organization, it can never be interfered with 
except by interfering with the organization, and 
hence, in its intrinsic force, is the same from age to 
age in the same nation. In different nations, com- 
pared together, it doubtless exists in different de- 
grees, being dependent in this respect, as might be 
easily proved, on climate. In Western Europe we 
may estimate its value from this, that if there be a 
perfect freedom for its unrestrained action, and its re- 
sults be submitted to no unusual causes of mortality, 
it will double a population in twenty-five years. 

Such being the absolute value of the generative 
force of society, the observed result in any case de- 



THEORY OF POPULATION. 153 

pends on the resistances. A human being must be 
fed, clothed, and sheltered, conditions the procure- 
ment of which implies labor. Insufficient food, inad- 
equate clothing, imperfect shelter, are the resisting 
forces in the problem of Population. Even with a 
free play for the generative force, the resistances con- 
trol the effect, since they act in a double way — oper- 
ating before birth so as in many instances to end life 
before that epoch, and after birth, insuring death by 
the starvation and misery they occasion. Practically 
speaking, then, it is quite true, as writers on Political 
Economy assert, that the increase of Population keeps 
pace with the increase of food. A critical examina- 
tion will, however, satisfy us that this is only a state- 
ment of one particular case of the general problem, 
and that, philosophically, all the resistances ought to 
be included. 

Since the time of the Jesuit Botero, it has been ad- 
mitted that no legal encouragement to matrimony 
can be effective unless there is a corresponding in- 
crease of the means of subsistence. Modern statistics 
have established that in Europe there is a close con- 
nection between the number of marriages and the 
price of corn. 

We must not overlook the interesting remark that 
the manner of operation of these Resistances is two- 
fold — physical and intellectual. Cold, the want of 
food and of clothing, will act instantaneously in ef 



154 THEORY OF POPULATION. 

fecting a reduction. The history of every famine is 
an illustration of such abruptness ; and the meagre 
population of countries in which the production of 
food is uniformly difficult, a testimony to the slower 
influence. But, besides this, man, being endowed 
with reason and continually looking to the future, 
puts a restraint upon himself. He will determine 
to refrain from marriage until he sees a clear pros- 
pect for the support of a family. He is unwilling to 
burden himself with a weight which he is not able 
yet to carry, and to inflict on those who must for 
many years be wholly helpless and dependent the in- 
evitable consequences of distress and misery. In civ- 
ilized, and especially in religious communities, this in- 
tellectual Eesistance assumes very great power. 

In any country the uniform generative social force 
goes on increasing the population until it is checked 
by the Resistances — the difficulty of feeding, clothing, 
sheltering — in short, by Poverty. It is a true maxim, 
that the principle of increase is always far more than 
sufficient to keep the population equal to its means 
of subsistence, and, indeed, in most countries, some- 
what overpasses that point, and establishes a con- 
stant pressure on the limits of supply, and a certain 
amount of destitution is the inevitable consequence, 
there now being births that must be starved. 

The statesman who is called upon to deal with the 
Problem of Population has, therefore, obviously the 



THEORY OF POPULATION. 155 

choice between two courses of action. He may touch 
the generative force, or he may touch the resistances ; 
for though, as has been said, in an absolute sense the 
power is uniform, yet there exist means by a resort 
to which its consequences may be indirectly inter- 
fered with or rendered nugatory. It seems to me, 
however, that practice in this direction must always 
imply immorality, and that an enlightened man will 
rely exclusively on the other mode. 

Would any one undertake to regulate the amount 
of air which shall be inspired in a given period of 
time, or the amount of food that shall be consumed ? 
"Would any one legislate as to the quantity of water 
that shall be lost by perspiration ? We recognize in 
these various things the connection between organiza- 
tion and its result. 

So in that other case, to which with needful ob- 
scurity I refer, he deceives himself who supposes that 
he can interrupt action while organization subsists: 
at the most, the effect is illusory, and is finding its 
manifestation in some other way. Public Celibacy is 
private wickedness. It is this dreadful truth, as ap- 
plicable to communities, which has induced several 
European governments to enter on those methods 
against which every religious man must revolt — the 
organization of prostitution. 

The other mode of influencing population we may 
consider without embarrassment. More food, cheap- 



156 THEORY OF POPULATION. 

er clothing, better houses, are insured by increased 
remunerative labor, and this is instantly followed by 
increase of numbers. These also are things which 
fall within the scope of enlightened legislation. To 
these must be added those noble discoveries we owe 
to physicians, such as vaccination, improved methods 
for the cure of diseases, and measures for the abate- 
ment of pestilence. These, by securing to the pro- 
ductive laborer more vigorous health and by dimin- 
ishing the death-rate, add directly and indirectly to 
the population. A similar result must occur from 
inventions which yield cheap clothing suited to the 
different seasons of the year, or add to the comforts 
and conveniences of houses. 

From this superficial consideration of the Problem 
of Population we gather a most instructive lesson — 
the same that we have already learned from our in- 
quiries respecting the origin, maintenance, distribu- 
tion, and extinction of animals and plants. This les- 
son is, that the world is governed by Law. The gen- 
eration of human life, the production of men, may be 
controlled by political agency and political conditions. 
Increases or diminutions of responsible immortal souls 
may be determined by statesmanship. 

Under the influence of such natural laws Europe 
received its population from its Asiatic intruders. 
Climate and other exterior conditions separated it 
into nations, of which each thenceforth pursued its 



THE PROGRESS OF HUMAN RACES. 157 

special way of life, imitating, as far as circumstances 
would permit, the successive stages of development 
of an individual. 

There is a progress for races of men as well marked 
as is the career of one man. There are thoughts and 
actions appertaining to specific periods of life in the 
one case as in the other. The march of individual 
existence shadows forth the march of race existence, 
being, indeed, its representation on a little scale. 
Among humble animals intercommunication converts 
groups into an individual. The hive is moved by a 
common sentiment, the birds of passage are marshal- 
ed in a suitable array. Among men, speech and writ- 
ing mould successive generations and different nations 
into one person. A society solicited by determinate 
physical influences would pass forward through a 
path as definite as that exhibited by a single man. 
A second society, completely separated from the pre- 
ceding by space or by time, would, under like influ- 
ences, do exactly the same thing. It is not a mere 
tendency, it is an actual performance. The infant of 
our time develops in the same way, and performs ac- 
tions suitable to his stage, as did the infant a thou- 
sand years ago. He who is born in Asia advances 
through the same stages, exhibiting therein corre- 
sponding actions as he who is born in America. The 
variations we perceive, as our examination of these 
actions becomes more minute, arise from the disturb- 



158 NECESSITY OF MATERIAL TO MENTAL CHANGE. 

ance of temporary and local causes, and the voluntary 
reaction of individuals on one another. No matter 
what diversity or dissimilarity we find at first, as we 
contemplate them with fixed attention and sufficient- 
ly long, their sameness becomes more and more man- 
ifest. 

As in the Individual, so in the Nation, the time for 
psychical change corresponds with that for physical. 
In the individual, structural development is the har- 
binger of the display of new functions. Examined 
from the first moment of life throughout the ascend- 
ing course, a variation in function is ever preceded by 
alteration in construction — so completely, indeed, that 
either being perceived, the other may be predicted. 
From this we gather the all-important conclusion that 
in national life it is altogether impossible to have ad- 
vancement unless there be a corresponding material 
change. We vainly attempt the improvement of a 
race, intellectually or morally, by missionary exertion 
or by education, unless we simultaneously touch its 
actual physical condition. Any impression made 
upon that gives the possibility of accomplishing the 
other. The conclusion to which we thus arrive from 
purely physiological considerations is strengthened by 
actual experience. Does the splendid generosity of 
Christendom in behalf of the heathen world receive 
that fruit which is fairly its due? Are not the ex- 
pected successes from year to year postponed \ 



NECESSITY OF MATERIAL TO MENTAL CHANGE. 159 

The mental change which has occurred in Europe 
during the last two centuries was rendered possible 
by concurring material changes. Of what avail is 
education, except it be in presence of an ameliorated 
social condition? The diminution of the blue -eyed 
races on that continent shows how profound has been 
the physiological change ; and better shelter, better 
clothing, better food, were the necessary precursors 
of better mental conceptions. Great amendments in 
the daily life of communities, great improvements in 
their manner of thinking, can only be attained by cor- 
responding physical modifications. 

It is with reluctance I acknowledge how small is 
the influence exerted by mere persuasion or even ex- 
ample. To elevate or to depress a group of men, it 
is necessary to touch their physical condition. If it 
were not so, how different would the career of the 
Indians upon this continent have been ! With the 
illustrious example of the white race before their 
eyes, ought they not to have joined in the progress, 
co-partners with us in a glorious advance ? How do 
those well-meaning men, who hope to accomplish the 
conversion and civilization of Nations by the preach- 
ing of a single missionary, account for the facts we 
have here ? The white American and the red Indian, 
in presence of one another, offer the missionary prob- 
lem in its grandest proportions. "We turn away from 
the undeniable result with disappointment and pain. 



160 CONSEQUENCES OF PERMANENT HABITATION. 

A people who have occupied the same soil beyond 
the memory of man, and who have never lbeen dis- 
turbed by admixture with others, may present a so- 
cial condition of repose and stability — a tendency to 
persist in their habits, whatever those habits may be ; 
if they are hunters and warriors, hunters and warriors 
they may continue. Conservatism is stamped upon 
them. They show no disposition to advance, and 
hence, no matter how active their intrinsic life, so- 
cially they are in repose. It is this state of stagna- 
tion which constitutes in European countries the real 
difficulty of elevating by education the lower orders. 
They cling to their maxims of life, no matter how 
evil — to their religious ideas, no matter how absurd, 
with a perversity that is almost beyond belief. At 
the best, they may be taught to imitate, but never 
to comprehend. They are at once impenetrable to 
knowledge and intolerant of change. The peasant, 
who cultivates his ancestral roods with the antique 
implement used in the Eoman times, looks with a 
mixed sentiment of derision and abomination on an 
improved plow. His intellectual stagnation can not 
be overcome by any legislation, nor even by the force 
of example. Experience the most melancholy teach- 
es us that the hand of violence can alone arouse him, 
the hand of violence alone improve him. It is this 
consideration which suggests to the philosophical 
mind a sad apology for the iniquities and calamities 
of conquest and war. 



CONSEQUENCES OF LOCOMOTION. \Q± 

A people who are new to the climate in which 
they live — who have not attained a physiological cor- 
respondence with its conditions — who are incessant- 
ly, universally, and profoundly disturbed by foreign 
blood - admixture, will exhibit a scene of intense so- 
cial activity. Among them will not be found that 
dead -weight of old communities, an obtuse lower 
class, almost impenetrable to knowledge and hating 
improvement ; but, in all the social members, thought 
takes the direction of individual and general improve- 
ment. From the bosom of the mass emerge with 
more facility and more numerously those who are 
gifted with superior endowments, who in an old 
community disentangle themselves from obscurity 
with much difficulty, or perhaps not at all. Here 
there is nothing of stagnation ; all is commotion and 
advance. 

I do not propose here to consider in detail the com- 
plications that must have occurred in the advancing 
progress of European nations, through their interac- 
tion upon each other. 

It is often affirmed that blood -admixture implies 
thought-variation. By this is meant that the inter- 
mingling of one race with another gives rise to a 
product not only participating in the bodily linea- 
ments of its progenitors, but in the mental lineaments 
too. Incorporation with a base race will lower the 
standard of a superior one. 

L 



162 ILLUSTRATION FROM EGYPTIAN HISTORY. 

The historical instances that might be quoted in 
proof of this are very numerous. Selecting one as 
an illustration, since I have had occasion to refer to 
Egypt before, I may return to that case again. Its 
language proves to us that in pre-historic times that 
country was wrested from its original African owners 
by successful Asiatic invaders. The occurrence of 
words referable to Indo-Germanic roots establishes 
that fact. The consequences of this event are seen in 
the social organization. The existence of caste dis- 
tinctions is an inevitable memento of violent con- 
quest. The superior caste is the descendant of the 
conquering race. In Egypt there were castes. 

But more than this, Eeligious ideas are indications 
of the social state. What is the interpretation that 
we must put on mummied bulls, and cats, and snakes? 
The adoration paid to them, was it the adoration of 
intelligent minds ? The priesthood of Egypt retained 
in purity the monotheistic conceptions their ancestors 
brought from Asia, keeping them for the initiated ; 
but the social condition of the nation required a base 
adulteration with the African worship of beasts. 

The ruling class, whose conceptions are made man- 
ifest to us by the stupendous ruins and eternal archi- 
tecture they have left, are then not to be blamed for 
the policy of exclusion they adopted. Their daily ex- 
perience brought them in contact with too many to- 
kens of the deterioration their race had suffered in the 



CONSEQUENCES OF BLOOD-ADMIXTURE. IQg 

old times by blood-admixture. Instinctively they shut 
out the foreigner. They kept the Hebrew under his 
taskmaster apart; they would neither eat with him 
nor mix with him. They made it death for the Euro- 
pean to set his foot in their country — that country of 
which, as they mournfully knew, the true emblem was 
a sphinx, with a human head and an animal body. 

It is not consistent with the prosperity of a Nation 
to permit heterogeneous mixtures of races that are 
physiologically far apart. Their inferior product be- 
comes a dead weight on the body politic. If Italy 
was for a thousand years after the extinction of the 
true Roman race a scene of anarchy, its hybrid inhab- 
itants being unable to raise it from its degradation, 
how indescribably deplorable must the condition be 
where there has been a mortal adulteration with 
African blood. 

At the close of the present century there will prob- 
ably be ninety millions of white inhabitants in the 
United States, and only about nine millions of col- 
ored. The periodical oscillations the black popula- 
tion has exhibited — their increasing more rapidly 
during one decade, as from 1820 to 1830, and de- 
clining during another, as from 1830 to 1840 — will 
probably be obliterated, if due, as is thought, to the 
excessive importation of African slaves from 1800 to 
1808. In the slower increase of the colored popula- 
tion, as compared with the white, supposing no direct 



164 CONSEQUENCES OF BLOOD-ADMIXTURE. 

political action to be resorted to, lies the solution of 
the Negro problem in America. 

The progress of blood -admixture is also very ob- 
vious. In 1850 one ninth of the colored class were 
returned as mulattoes, but in 1860 the proportion 
had risen to one eighth. Of every 100 colored births, 
17 were mulattoes and 83 blacks. There is every 
reason to believe that the mingling of the two races 
is unfavorable to the vitality of their hybrid product. 

Let us now, in conclusion, proceed to apply the 
philosophical facts we have been considering by the 
light of historical evidence to the special case of our 
own country. 

The principles chiefly to be borne in mind are these 
— that the political effect of emigration depends upon 
the grade of society from which the emigrating mass 
.has issued, being very different in the case of the la- 
boring and of the intellectual classes respectively — 
that homogeneousness in a community imparts sta- 
bility, though it eventually implies stagnation — that 
a community suffering incessant blood -disturbance 
will exhibit social activity, though, if the disturbing 
element is very base, a corresponding depreciation of 
its absolute value will ensue. 

In the Southern States there are two races physio- 
logically distinct — the white, which may be regarded 
as not liable to blood - contamination, and therefore 



BLOOD-DISTURBANCE IN THE UNITED STATES. 165 

becoming yearly more and more homogeneous; the 
black, liable, as we have seen, to increasing contam- 
ination of so extraneous and different a kind that the 
result becomes purposeless. 

In the Northern States the blood -disturbance is 
through emigration. Its effect would be more mark- 
ed if the stream did not now mainly from Ireland 
and Germany, countries bounded by the same annual 
isothermals that limit New York on the north and 
Washington on the south. The movement which 
this class of population has to accomplish, to come 
into correspondence with the new conditions, is not 
great ; but a careful observer will not fail to detect 
the retardation it impresses on the movement of its 
predecessors, and their corresponding detention in 
the lower intellectual states. The manner of thought 
of the whole community is less definite, its ideas less 
settled, its intentions less precise. 

The Atlantic States have been the seat from which 
has issued the emigration destined to people the 
West. So far as their agricultural population is con- 
cerned, several of them may be regarded as having 
passed into a stationary condition. Of this, Vermont 
may be taken as an example, its census report for 
1860 being substantially the same as that for 1850. 
If the limit of land -support has thus been reached, 
any farther advance must be looked for from com- 
mercial and manufacturing avocations. The North- 



166 INTERNAL MIGRATIONS IN THE UNITED STATES. 

western States offer a striking contrast. In the same 
decade Illinois doubled its population. Owing to 
their remarkable salubrity and unrivaled fertility, 
those regions are fast becoming the granary of Eu- 
rope. 

From the older states, in this manner, a very large 
portion of their population has been removed, in the 
general aggregate about one fourth having emigrated. 
In 1850 the large number of 4,176,000 whites were 
living in states where they were not born. In thirty 
states the native emigrants have chiefly preferred to 
locate in a state adjacent to that of their birth; the 
overflow has been greatest nearest its sources, yet- 
progressive and diffusive in all directions. In gen- 
eral, and in obedience to the principle I have indica- 
ted, these emigrants move on parallels of latitude. 

Now it is to be observed that the countries thus 
settled bear a resemblance, social and political, to 
those from which their population was first derived ; 
a fact pointing to the conclusion that the abstraction 
made from the Atlantic States has been in a propor- 
tional manner from each of their three social grades. 
The effect of this has been to keep those states intel- 
lectually in a stationary condition, or to retard the 
development they would otherwise have made. So- 
ciety, retaining in them more or less completely its 
interior primitive balance, has lost the advantage 
that would have been derived had the field of action 



CONSEQUENCES OF INTERNAL MIGRATION. 157 

teen limited, the population more dense, the mental 
competition more violent. This is the explanation 
of the remark so often made, that our material pros- 
perity and our mental progress have not advanced 
with an equal step. 

The emigrating mass has also been placed under 
extraordinary conditions. Peopling an uninhabited 
region, it has suffered no deterioration from blood-ad- 
mixture with lower tribes. The change that is be- 
ing impressed upon it is altogether the effect of cli- 
mate. Physically it hastens to come into correspond- 
ence with the new circumstances, and is ever moving 
in an ascending course. The length of time to be oc- 
cupied in the metamorphosis before complete accord- 
ance is gained must be very considerable, and sub- 
ject to a perpetual retardation, if continued emigra- 
tion is all the time going on. 

On the other hand, the length of time and the 
course to be gone through are shortened by that ar- 
tificial equalization of Climate accomplished in civil- 
ized life. The building and warming of houses, the 
adjustment of clothing, the selection of food, compen- 
sate very largely for differences of climate, and bring 
us all to a more homogeneous state. 

Of course, it would be in vain to deny that while 
all this is taking place, and as matters now stand, the 
intellectual position is very far below that which will 
inevitably be ultimately reached. Our journalism, 



168 CONSEQUENCES OE INTERNAL MIGRATION. 

our criticism, our educational establishments, bear 
evidence to the depression under which they neces- 
sarily labor. In fact, our situation is such that we 
actually can not profitably take advantage of the 
knowledge that we do possess. 

An illustration will point out what I mean. A 
Virginia planter grows tobacco on his land until he 
has exhausted it. Of what avail to him is agricultu- 
ral chemistry, with all its great discoveries ? It might 
cost him five hundred dollars an acre to repair the 
mischief he has done to his estate ; but he can buy 
virgin lands in the West at a dollar and a quarter an 
acre. Agricultural colleges are of no use to him. 
And so, for miles together in the Southern States, 
there are desolated and forsaken tracts — old fields, as 
they are called. But, if land is worth little, labor is 
worth much. Whoever can invent a labor-saving 
machine will make money. So our improvements 
are not in the direction of agricultural chemistry, 
but of agricultural mechanism. 

In like manner with our educational establish- 
ments. Many intelligent persons speak depreciating- 
ly of them, not considering duly the invisible press- 
ure there is upon them. Their humble position for 
the time being is unavoidable. It is not to be 
amended by the system of multiplying them. That 
only makes them more importunate rivals in beg- 
gary. For years to come our public schools must 



MIGRATION TO THE SOUTH. 169 

be the seats of superficial learning ; and we must ac- 
cept it as an unavoidable fact, with the sad conse- 
quence taught us by European statistics, that that 
kind of instruction does not lead to the diminution, 
but rather to the increase of immorality. We must 
pass through the temporary evil to reach the final 
good. 

Such I consider to be the present effect of the emi- 
gration that has been going on from the Atlantic 
States to the West — we endure a temporary retard- 
ation. But, should the course of that emigration be 
shortly diverted to the South, an event by no means 
beyond the bounds of possibility, the conditions of 
the problem are essentially altered, and far - seeing 
statesmen will discern that the experience we have 
hitherto had will be altogether inapplicable. The 
blood-admixture that must inevitably ensue with the 
white population of the South — a population that 
has nearly become homogeneous, nearly in agreement 
with the climate it is inhabiting, which has hitherto 
been disturbed by emigration to only an insignificant 
• extent, and which, in its origin, was sensibly different 
from ours — that blood - admixture will make itself 
powerfully felt in the consequences that must ensue. 

In these remarks as to the probability of an emi- 
gration to the South, it will doubtless be perceived 
that there is implied the transient nature of the ex- 
isting alienation, an extinction of the bitterness of 



170 COMPARATIVE EFFECTS OF WARS. 

feeling pervading that portion of the country. There 
is a great difference between Civil and Foreign Wars 
as respects the permanence of the sentiments they en- 
gender. History is full of examples how speedily 
the feuds of a Civil War die away. Man is so con- 
stituted that he spontaneously resigns to oblivion his 
unsuccessful undertakings ; and, since they form by 
far the larger proportion of the things he does, he is 
reconciled by habit to that forgetfulness. The van- 
quished in a civil strife avoids a recollection of his 
disappointed hopes. The victor abstains from a con- 
templation of his success : he feels that he can afford 
to forget even glory; and so the memory of such 
events speedily passes away. New objects, new mo- 
tives, new pursuits are presented, and society starts 
again on a new basis. How brief a space it took, in 
the old times, to obliterate all memory of the awful 
civil wars of the Roman Empire — in later times, of 
those of England ! It will take a still shorter period 
to do the same in the activity of human life in 
America. 

The Pacific front of America, compared with its 
Atlantic front, presents differences so striking, that 
the future physiological effect can not fail to be im- 
portant. " A cold sea-current so reduces the temper- 
ature of summer, that July is only eight or nine Fah- 
renheit degrees warmer than January, and September 
is the hottest month. For this reason, Indian corn 



THE PACIFIC STATES. 171 

fails to come to maturity, though wheat and other 
cereals, as well as orchard fruits, attain their utmost 
perfection. The elastic atmosphere and bracing ef 
feet of the climate have been remarked by settlers 
from all parts of the world." 

From the remarks made on page 91, it will be in- 
ferred that the Pacific shore of the United States is 
destined hereafter to be the scene of an active Asiatic 
emigration. So vast is the mineral and agricultural 
wealth of those regions, so importunate the demand 
for labor, so remunerative its result, that the settled 
and torpid populations of China, Japan, India, can not 
fail to be affected. Already from the first of those 
countries the vanguard of such an intruding column 
has appeared. The Chinese population of California 
is far from insignificant, and is steadily increasing : in 
1860 it was 34,933. It is of no importance that for 
the present these people look upon the country they 
thus visit as merely a temporary abode, in which 
money is to be made,, and that, as their moderate ex- 
pectations of a competency are fulfilled, they hasten 
to return to their native place. That is the natural 
timidity of early adventurers. 

But these, in due season, will be followed by oth- 
ers having more settled intentions. The dislike the 
American population has to them once abating — that 
temporary dislike which all races of men who differ 
in aspect, in ideas, in religion from one another always 



172 INTRODUCTION OF EASTERN HABITS. 

entertain — the general principles of the system of the 
Republic will come into powerful effect. The facility 
for acquiring proprietorship in land, the certainty of 
its tenure, are temptations that no laboring class can 
resist. In the same street will be seen the Joss- 
house, the Synagogue, the Mosque, the Chapel, the 
Church. 

Considering that, under the circumstances of the 
case, the individuals who are thus destined to disturb 
the Pacific Coast must necessarily issue from the low- 
er social grades of the countries from which they 
come, their admixture with the native American pop- 
ulation can not be viewed without anxiety. The Pa- 
cific States will do well to look to their public schools, 
laying broad and munificent foundations for their ed- 
ucational system, giving no encouragement to the use 
of any foreign tongue, and fusing into their mass, as 
thoroughly and rapidly as may be, their inevitable 
hybrid population. 

With Eastern blood will necessarily come Eastern 
thoughts, and the attempt at Eastern social habits. I 
have already (page 113) referred to the political pow- 
er of polygamic institutions. It must not be forgot- 
ten that they are in accordance with the sentiments 
of Asiatics. Especially, also, should it be borne in 
mind that they have already obtained a firm root in 
Utah. There is imminent danger of the spread of 
those institutions in the West. As men approach 



THE POLYGAMY OF UTAH. 173 

the confines of Asia, they seem to be affected by its 
moral atmosphere. 

Nor should we overlook an additional source of 
disturbance from the population of Mexico — a base, a 
hybrid population. Whatever may be the political 
destiny of that country > contamination from it is un- 
avoidable. The day will come when the sentiments 
expressed by the Emperor Claudius in relation to the 
Gauls, which I have quoted, page 149, will be urged 
in the Senate of the United States in relation to these 
people. 

For the sake of drawing my reader's attention for 
cibly to this prospective state of affairs on the west 
ern front of the Republic, I have dwelt in some de 
tail on the history of Arabian conquests and their ex 
traordinary permanence. If he should see this inter- 
esting subject in the same light that it presents it 
self to me, I would ask his perusal of Chapters XI 
and XVI. of my " History of the Intellectual Devel 
opment of Europe." 

"Whatever may at present be the strength of the 
sentiment of disapproval or even of detestation with 
which we regard polygamy, we can not conceal from 
ourselves the strong temptations that will arise for 
its adoption in the West. We should remember how 
easily and how often, in an evil hour, great and even 
religious communities may be led astray. Our pres- 
ent abhorrence of this vice is no greater than was the 



174 THE POLYGAMY OF UTAH. 

abhorrence of human slavery in England a few years 
ago. Yet, because of a contingent political advan- 
tage — the division and consequent neutralization of 
a maritime rival — that country forgot her noblest 
philanthropic traditions, and arrayed herself in moral 
support of the slave power in America. 

Warned by such a conspicuous example, we need 
not be surprised if hereafter there should be politi- 
cians — statesmen I will not call them — who may see 
in an extension of the practices of Utah a solution of 
the portentous problem of the admixture of the Pa- 
cific races. As the Saracens Arabized the north of 
Africa in the course of a very few years, they may 
believe that it is possible to Americanize those races. 

Fifty years ago it would have been thought incred- 
ible that a polygamic state should exist in the midst 
of Christian communities of European descent ; and 
yet a community, whose foundation rests on a relig- 
ious imposture, has carried before our eyes that insti- 
tution into practical effect, and is fast becoming rich 
and powerful. 

There is always a probability of the public adoj> 
tion of political ideas when they concur with the in- 
terests or passions of those to whom they are ad- 
dressed ; and conversely, it is from a want of such a 
concordance that attempts at reformation and eleva- 
tion of the ideas of men so often prove failures. We 
can not deny the melancholy fact that men are 



THE POLYGAMY OF UTAH. 175 

guided much less by their own perceptions of right 
and wrong than by an apprehension of what public 
opinion in the case may be. Many will brave their 
own conscience — few society. Conscience may be 
mystified and blunted, but over society an individual 
has very little control. Hence it comes to pass that 
personal morality is too often much more the conse- 
quence of public opinion than of individual con- 
science ; and hence the explanation of the remark so 
often made by observant persons, that men who are 
knaves as individuals, may yet, as a community, be 
honest. 

This lax morality may, I believe, be more conspic- 
uously detected among trading communities than 
among agriculturists. Life among the latter is indi- 
vidually more independent, but position in the former 
turns altogether on the consideration and credit that 
a man enjoys among those with whom he has deal- 
ings. He is constrained to comport himself according 
to their standard. 

Where public opinion has been dexterously man- 
ufactured, and the interests and passions of men are 
insidiously provoked, very serious political faults may 
be perpetrated. No community can be altogether 
safe from such risks. 

Since the decline of the Koman Empire, no nation 
has been called upon to deal with questions of civil 
policy so extensive and profound as those that must 



176 EUROPE AND AMERICA. 

necessarily occupy the attention of the Republic. In 
Europe, the nations that have risen to what is there 
considered to be imposing power occupy compara- 
tively small geographical surfaces; the problems in 
which they are interested have not the grandeur as- 
sumed by analogous problems here. With them, for 
instance, the effect of climate is but small, the conse- 
quences of emigration easily foreseen. Though those 
nations may assume very striking importance as re- 
gards the distribution of wealth, they sink at once 
into insignificance as respects its creation. There is 
nothing in Europe that answers to the vast deposits 
of metals and minerals in North America — nothing 
to its cotton, its tobacco — nothing to the agriculture 
of the prairies. The whole population of that con- 
tinent could be settled in the Mississippi Valley, and 
find itself all the better for the change. 

Still more, those nation's are fettered by the results 
of the policy of past ages. They perpetually find 
stumbling-blocks in their way that are moss-covered 
and rotten, yet sufficiently impracticable to arrest 
their advancement completely. With the noblest 
aspirations, what can Italy do in presence of the 
anachronism of Rome ? In France it is not the ar- 
bitrary will of the sovereign, but the public necessity 
that denies free speech and a free press. 

But Europe never possessed that inappreciable 
privilege that has fallen to the lot of America — unity. 



EUROPE AND AMERICA. 177 

The intentions of her greatest and best men are 
thwarted by the impossibility of securing consistent 
actions among so many rival and antagonistic states. 
It is because of her want of it that, after so many 
centuries of trial, she has attained to no settled 
maxims of political life, and to no definite religious 
opinions. 

Whatever, therefore, can make firm the bond of 
union on this continent, will aid in securing develop- 
ment of national power. An inflexible resolution, in 
the midst of the unparalleled sacrifices of the civil 
war, has shown how thoroughly that principle is ap- 
preciated. Was ever such a thing known in the 
world before as the spending of eight hundred mil- 
lions of dollars a year, for four successive years, to 
sustain an idea? That fact betokens the future 
grandeur of the Great Republic ! Climate and Emi- 
gration may tend to divide ; but as long as that prin- 
ciple is so steadfastly kept in view and so irresistibly 
maintained, the means will certainly be found to neu- 
tralize their prejudicial effects. 

M 



CHAPTER III. 

OX THE POLITICAL FOECE OE IDEAS. 

Ideas act on masses of men in a double manner, sometimes ex- 
erting an impelling, sometimes a resisting agency. 

The Impelling power of Ideas is illustrated in the case of Mo- 
hammedanism, of which the political development as attained 
in Spain, and the Intellectual, as 'manifested in the philoso- 
phy of Averroes, are described. 

The Resisting power of Ideas is illustrated, in the case of the 
Jews. A brief sketch is given of their history, their sacred 
writings, and the modifications impressed upon them by the 
Persians, Greeks, and Arabs. It is their Messianic idea that 
resists the infiuences of Conquest and Time, and preserves them 
a sep>arate p>eop>le among all nations. 

Man may comprehend Mature and subjugate physical forces. 
Under this Idea modern civilization is advancing. It is il- 
lustrated by a sketch of certain scientific discoveries and use- 
ful inventions. 

The ecclesiastical causes of the Europ>ean opposition to Science 
are explained, and the duty of America to develop andp>rotect 
free thought is enforced. 

Philosophical conceptions of the historical prog- 
ress of humanity must not be altogether of a material 
kind. Thus far, however, such has been the view of- 
fered in the preceding pages, which have been occu- 
pied with a consideration of the control of Climate 
over the constitution of man, and the Effects of Emi- 
gration. To this we have now to add the impelling 
and resisting power of Ideas. Ideas force humanity 



ARABIA. 179 

forward, though Nature has prepared the path along 
which the course must be run. They also furnish a 
bulwark that can resist the attacks of Time. 

An Idea may therefore possess supreme political 
influence. A sentiment expressed by a few words 
may break up nationalities venerable for their antiq- 
uity, rearrange races of men, and revolutionize the 
world. 

Many instances present themselves as suitable il- 
lustrations of these truths. Roine, for example, would 
yield an appropriate text. I turn, however, from 
cases which perhaps might lose their weight because 
of our familiarity with them, to one which, partly 
from prejudice and partly from policy, has hitherto 
been very much sequestered from our view. 

On the eastern shore of the Red Sea, a fringe of 
fertile land received from the people of antiquity the 
designation of Arabia the Fortunate, or Happy. This 
Paradise, described as a land of incense and perfumes, 
recedes through low ranges of interior hills, and loses 
itself in endless deserts of sand. Of its mountains, 
some, as Horeb and Sinai, have become sanctified in 
the history of the human race. In the dry season 
scarce ever a cloud is seen on the sky. It is a river- 
less country, but in the rainy season the gorges con- 
tain rushing torrents. In different localities the tem- 
perature greatly varies: there are nights that are 
freezing cold, and days when the heat rises to 100°. 



130 AEABIA. 

Here and there, embosomed in the sand, are beauti- 
ful oases, like those of Africa, natural gardens of won- 
derful luxuriance in the midst of a frightful sterility. 
The hot breath of the simoom that blows over the 
sultry waste feels as though it issued from the mouth 
of a furnace. The moving and bending columns that 
seem to reach to the sky, into which eddying whirl- 
winds work up the shifting sands, are said, in the 
poetical imagery of the inhabitants, to conceal be- 
neath their dusty veil fleeting genii of the desert, 
angels of desolation, bowing their heads in homage to 
the Lord. 

A paradise it was truly called. See of what valu- 
able products it is the native home — the sugar-cane, 
the banana, the tamarind, the cotton-tree, the nutmeg, 
and the melon in all its varieties. Here nourish the 
date-tree, the cocoa, the fan-leaved palm, the fig, orange, 
vine, quince, apricot, almond, and plantain. The hor- 
ticulturist may envy its botany ; the physician bestow 
a nod of approval on a land that has given him the 
castor-oil plant and senna, and brought him many a 
profitable fee. 

How much has the morality of the world been im- 
proved by coffee, first brought from Arabia ! A sub- 
stitute for intoxicating drinks, it has refined society, 
imparted innocent comfort to individuals, and peace 
to many a family. We abuse the abstemious relig- 
ion of Mecca, the berry of Mocha we use. 



MOHAMMED. 181 

The wilderness of Arabia is the birthplace of that 
most noble of all quadrupeds, the horse. Though his 
neck is clothed with thunder, and the glory of his 
nostrils is terrible — though he paweth in the valley 
and rejoiceth in his strength — though he swalloweth 
the ground in his fierceness and rage, neither can he 
persuade himself that it is the sound of the trumpet 
— though he smelleth the battle afar off, the thunder 
of the captains and the shouting, he plays with the 
Bedouin children that are round his master's tent. 
How deeply has a love of that beautiful creature af- 
fected the civilization of Europe ! What had it not 
to do with chivalry ! It turned the bloodthirsty war- 
rior into a gentle and courteous knight. 

If, as we have seen, Climate and the aspect of Na- 
ture give a special character to humanity, what kind 
of men should we expect in a riverless and forestless 
country — the companions of the camel and the horse ? 
With a just pride, the inhabitants boast that their 
land has been the birthplace of the sciences and of 
the religion of half the human race. 

In the year 569 was born at Mecca, a little town 
in that country, now sacred in the eyes of all Mussul- 
men, a man who has exerted an enduring influence 
on the human race — Mohammed, by Europeans sur- 
named the Impostor. Though descended from an an- 
cient and proud family, his early life was spent in 
penury ; and while only yet a boy of thirteen years, 



182 CAUSE OF MENTAL DELUSIONS. 

he was constrained so completely to give himself up 
to the pursuits of trade, that his enemies have affirm- 
ed he never knew how to read or write. Industry, 
and marriage with an opulent widow, whose agent he 
had "been for a length of time, gave him wealth at 
last, and enabled him, "before he had reached forty, to 
abandon his mercantile pursuits. 

In very remote times — so remote that the circum- 
stance had almost degenerated into a legend — there 
had fallen at Mecca, from the sky, a mass of iron, such 
as is now termed a meteoric stone. The primitive in- 
habitants had guarded this celestial body with relig- 
ious care, erected a temple for its custody, and wor- 
shiped it as a god. Their idolatry had also extended 
to the adoration of certain graven forms. 

"Whether through the self-denial of a too abstemi- 
ous life, or through that profound religious melan- 
choly into which good men who have had large ex- 
perience of the vanities of the world sometimes fall, 
Mohammed became the victim of mental illusion. 
There were unseen voices that whispered to him, and 
phantoms that he saw. In lucid intervals he sus- 
pected the evil into which he was falling, and warned 
his wife Chadizah that he feared he might become in- 
sane. 

From the Jewish anchorets who of old sought a re- 
treat beneath the shade of the palms of Engaddi, who 
beguiled their weary hours in the chanting of psalms 



CAUSE OF MENTAL DELUSIONS. 183 

by the bitter waters of the Dead Sea — from the phil- 
osophic Hindoo, who sought for happiness in bodily 
inaction and mental exercise, to the preaching soldier, 
who enforces his opinions by the edge of his sword, 
the stages of delusion are numerous and successive. 
But, so far from being impostures, these are nothing 
more than may be produced at any time. In the 
brain of man, impressions of whatever he has seen or 
heard, of whatever has been made manifest to him by 
his other senses, nay, even the vestiges of his former 
thoughts, are stored up. These traces are most vivid 
at first, but by degrees they decline in force, though 
they probably never completely die out. During 
our waking hours, while we are perpetually receiving 
new impressions from things that surround us, such 
vestiges are overpowered, and can not attract the at- 
tention of the mind ; but in the period of sleep, when 
external influences cease, they emerge from oblivion, 
and the mind, submitting to the delusion, groups 
them into the fantastic forms of dreams. By the use 
of opium and other drugs which can blunt our sen- 
sibility to passing events, these phantasms may be 
evoked. They also offer themselves in the delirium 
of fevers and in the hour of death. 

It is immaterial in what manner or by what agency 
our susceptibility to the impressions of surrounding 
objects is benumbed, whether by drugs, or sleep, or 
disease ; as soon as their force is no greater than that 



184 CAUSE OF MENTAL DELUSIONS 

of forms already registered in the brain, these last 
will appear before us, and deceptions and apparitions 
are the result. No man can submit to long-continued 
and rigorous fasting without becoming the subject of 
these hallucinations ; and the more he enfeebles his 
organs of sense, the more vivid is the exhibition, the 
more profound the illusion. 

The images that may thus emerge in the brain 
have been classed by physiologists among the phe- 
nomena of inverse vision or cerebral sight. From 
the moral effect to which they can give rise, we are 
very liable to connect them with the supernatural. 
In truth, they are, however, the natural result of the 
action of the nervous mechanism, which of necessity 
produces them when in the proper condition. It can 
act either directly, as in ordinary vision, or inversely, 
as in cerebral sight, and in this resjDect resembles 
those instruments which equally yield a musical 
sound whether the air is blown through them or 
drawn in. Yet, natural as their production is, such 
is the constitution of man, that the bravest and 
wisest encounter these fictions of their own imagina- 
tion with awe. Few things, in fact, have exerted a 
greater influence on the career of the human race 
than these spiritual visitations. The visions of Mo- 
hammed have ended in tincturing the daily life of 
half the people of Asia and Africa for a thousand 
years. A spectre that came into the camp at Sardis 



CAUSE OF MENTAL DELUSIONS. 185 

unnerved the heart of Brutus, and thereby put an end 
to the political system that had made the great re- 
public the arbitress of the world. 

It is the localization of the phantom — that creation 
of the brain — among the bodies and things around 
us, that gives force to these illusions. The form of a 
cloud no bigger than the hand is perhaps first seen 
floating over the carpet ; but this, as the eye follows 
it, takes on a definite shape, and the sufferer sees with 
dismay a moping raven perched on some of the dis- 
tant articles of furniture. Or, out of an indistinct 
cloud, female faces, sometimes of surprising loveliness, 
emerge, a new face succeeding as a former dies away. 
The mind, ever ready to practice imposture upon it- 
self, will at last accompany the illusion with grotesque 
or dreadful inventions. A sarcophagus, painted after 
the manner of the Egyptians, distresses the visionary 
with the rolling of its eyes. Sometimes, instead of a 
solitary phantom intruding itself among recognized 
realities, as the shade of a deceased friend opens the 
door and noiselessly steps in, the complicated scenes 
of a true drama are displayed — the brain becomes, as 
it were, a theatre. According as the travel or the 
reading of the sick man may have been, the illusion 
takes a style — black vistas of Oriental architecture 
that stretch away into infinite night — temples, and 
fanes, and the battlemented walls of cities, colossal 
Pharaohs sitting in everlasting silence with their 



186 THE DELUSIONS OF MOHAMMED. 

hands upon their knees, " I saw," says De Quincey, 
in his Confessions of an Opium Eater, " as I lay awake 
in "bed, vast processions that passed along in mourn- 
ful pomp ; friezes of never-ending stories, that to my 
feelings were as sad and solemn as if they were sto- 
ries drawn from times before (Edipus or Priam, be- 
fore Tyre, before Memphis. And, at the same time, a 
corresponding change took place in my dreams; a 
theatre seemed suddenly opened and lighted up with- 
in my brain, which presented nightly spectacles of 
more than earthly splendor." 

Mohammed, having retired to the solitude of the 
desert, devoted himself to meditation, fasting, prayer, 
and became the victim of these cerebral delusions. 
He was visited by supernatural appearances, myste- 
rious voices accosting him as the Prophet of God. It 
is related that, as he sat alone with Chadizah his 
wife, a shadow entered the tent. "Dost thou see 
aught V said Chadizah, who remarked his agitation, 
and who, after the manner of Arabian matrons, wore 
her veil. " I do," said the Prophet ; whereupon she 
uncovered her face and said, " Dost thou see it now ?" 
" I do not," " Glad tidings to thee, O Mohammed !" 
exclaimed Chadizah ; " it is an angel, for he has re- 
spected my unveiled face ; an evil spirit would not." 
As his disease advanced, these sj)ectres became more 
frequent. It was from one of them that he received 
the divine commission to preach. " I," said his wife, 



THE FORCE OE AN IDEA. 187 

" will be thy first believer," and they knelt clown in 
prayer together. Since that eventful night nine thou- 
sand millions of human beings have acknowledged 
him to be a prophet of Gocl. 

A preaching soldier ! The qualities implied in that 
character belong only to the highest rank of men. 
Of such was Mohammed. His theology was simple 
— " There is but one God ;" but to that he also add- 
ed, " and Mohammed is his Prophet." 

The great earthquake of Lisbon, in 1755, was felt 
from Norway to Morocco, from Poland to the West 
Indies. It absolutely lifted the whole bed of the 
North Atlantic Ocean. What a vast physical im- 
pulse that implies ! 

But is there no political force in an Idea? The 
dogma of Mohammed sent a quivering thrill through 
the souls of men from the Gulf of Guinea to the Chi- 
nese Sea. Three continents — Asia, Africa, Europe- 
rocked to their foundations under it. Empires ven- 
erable for their antiquity, religions covered with the 
hoar of antiquity, vanished away. As the breath can 
melt the graceful ice-forms that incrust a window on 
a winter's morning, so the breath of the Prophet melt- 
ed away whole races of men and their works. 

There is something wonderful in this propagation 
of thought from man to man. As a candle may be 
lighted from a flame, and again and again others may 
be kindled in succession one from another without 



188 PKOGRESS OF MOHAMMEDANISM. 

any impairment of the intrinsic brightness, so thought 
passes from one to another, ever growing, never losing 
its innate force. That thought — the oneness of God, 
and a divine mission imposed on a man — passed forth 
from the Prophet and was received by his trusting 
wife. In the departing twilight of an Arabian sum- 
mer's evening they knelt down, hand in hand, at the 
entrance of their tent. They prayed to the All-mer- 
ciful that he would take pity on them and show them 
what to do. In a few months the fire had kindled in 
a few zealous disciples. It occasioned a brief strug- 
gle in Arabia : there were battles. God gave victory 
to his servant : the country bowed under the convin- 
cing argument of his sw^ord. Within twelve years 
after the death of their great leader his followers had 
reduced the chief fortified places in Persia, Syria, Afri- 
ca. They quickly extended their dominion a thou- 
sand miles east and a thousand west. The churches 
of Syria and of Asia Minor, that garden of the world, 
were utterly destroyed; above all, Jerusalem, the 
Holy City of the East, with all its touching recollec- 
tions, was seized. In Persia, its native place, Magian- 
ism, a religion venerable for its antiquity, went down 
before the storm ; in India, Vedaism, the worship of 
Nature, the pantheistic belief of one hundred and 
twenty millions of men, met its rival and master ; in 
China, Buddhism, the settled creed of four hundred 
millions, shared the same fate. The tempest of Sara- 



PROGRESS OF MOHAMMEDANISM. 189 

cen armies pushed its conquering career along the 
north coast of Africa. Confronted by the impassable 
Atlantic, the Arabs turned aside into Spain, and held 
that country for as long as it is from the Norman con- 
quest of England to our day. Almost as if by a mira- 
cle, the rest of Europe escaped. 

"There is but one God, and Mohammed is his 
Prophet." The vanquished must make his choice be- 
tween that confession, or tribute, or death. 

Is there, then, no political force in an Idea ? Gold 
and silver, and iron and coal, and cotton and oil, ma- 
terial things that are forced out of the earth, are these 
the divinities? An idea can shake humanity to its 
foundations, an idea can govern the world. 

It is impossible to compress into the limited space 
at my disposal the long story of the consequences of 
all these wonderful political events. It is needful to 
make a selection, and I choose that which has proved 
to be the most closely connected with the history of 
Western Europe, and therefore with our own — the 
Saracen conquest of Spain. 

Scarcely had the Arabs become firmly settled in 
Spain before they commenced a brilliant career. 
Adopting what had now become the established pol- 
icy of the Commanders of the Faithful, the Khalifs 
of Cordova distinguished themselves as patrons of 
learning, and set an example of refinement strongly 
contrasting with the condition of the native European 



190 THE SARACENS IN SPAIN. 

princes. Cordova, under their administration, boast- 
ed of more than 200,000 houses and more than a mil- 
lion of inhabitants. After sunset a man might walk 
through it in a straight line for ten miles by the light 
of the public lamps : seven hundred years after this 
time there was not so much as one public lamp in 
London. Its streets were solidly paved : in Paris, 
centuries subsequently, w T hoever stepped over his 
threshold on a rainy day> stepped up to his ankles in 
mud. The Spanish Mohammedans had brought with 
them all the luxuries of Asia. Their residences stood 
forth against the clear blue sky, or were embosomed 
in woods. They had polished marble balconies over- 
hanging orange gardens, courts with cascades of wa- 
ter, retiring-rooms vaulted with stained glass speckled 
with gold ; the floors and walls were of exquisite mo- 
saics. Here a fountain of quicksilver shot up in a 
glistening spray, the glittering particles falling with 
a tranquil sound like fairy bells ; there, apartments 
into which cool air was drawn in summer from flower- 
gardens. Clusters of frail marble columns surprised 
the beholder with the vast weights they bore. In 
the boudoirs of the Sultanas they were sometimes 
of verd antique, and incrusted with lapis - lazuli. 
Through pipes of metal, water both warm and cold, 
to suit the season of the year, ran into baths of mar- 
ble ; in niches, where the current of air could be ar- 
tificially directed, hung dripping alcarazzas. There 



THE SARACENS IN SPAIN. 191 

were whispering -galleries for the amusement of the 
women, labyrinths and marble play-courts for the 
children, for the master himself grand libraries. At 
this brilliant focus barbarian Europe lighted its lamp 
of civilization. 

Such were the Khalifs of the West; such their 
splendor, their luxury. Considering the enchanting 
country over which they ruled, it was not without 
reason that they caused to be engraven on the public 
seal, " The servant of the Most Merciful rests content- 
ed in the decrees of God." What more, indeed, could 
they have had ? But, considering also the evil end 
of all this happiness and pomp, we may well appre- 
ciate the solemn truth which these monarchs, in their 
day of pride and power, grandly wrote in the beauti- 
ful mosaics on their palace walls — an ever -recurring 
monition to him who ow^es dominion to the sword — 
" There is no conqueror but God." 

From these political events I turn to philosophical 
results, with a view of showing what, in that direc- 
tion, were the consequences of the fundamental Ara- 
bian idea. 

History conspicuously teaches that there will al- 
ways emerge from every great religious confession 
men who endeavor to cast light on its principles by 
the aid of human reason — men who will philosophize. 
If, therefore, we desire to measure the force of an idea 
and to master all its bearings intelligently, we must 



192 MOHAMMEDAN PHILOSOPHY. 

add to the estimate of its material or political moment- 
um an appreciation of its philosophical development. 
That is what I now proceed to do in the present case. 

Within a century after Mohammed's death, so act- 
ive was the mental movement among his followers 
that they began to dispute about free-will and pre- 
destination. Soon in Bagdad controversies arose re- 
specting the attributes of God, and philosophical 
schools were founded, the branches of which ramified 
along the coast of Africa into Spain, and in the oppo- 
site direction extended into the far East. We com- 
prehend at once the spirit of these schools when we 
consider the bearing of the maxim of one destined 
eventually to stand at the head of all the rest * " The 
sjDecial religion of philosophers is to study what is 
sublime, and the most sublime worship that can be 
rendered to God is the study of his works." There, 
if I mistake not, was the secret of the Saracen delight 
in the cultivation of natural science. 

At the capture of Alexandria, in the early days of 
Mohammedanism, the Saracens were brought in con- 
tact with the vestiges of Greek philosophy. The 
Christians whom they found there had long leaned to 
the views of Plato, whose doctrines had been cultiva- 
ted by some of them with singular effect. On the 
other hand, the Saracens attached themselves to Aris- 
totle as their scientific guide. And thus it came to 
pass that the higher aspects of Mohammedanism 



MOHAMMEDAN PHILOSOPHY, 193 

were tinctured with the opinions of that great Greek 
writer, and the Arabians held to be the expounders 
of the Aristotelian philosophy. A very great mod- 
ern critic regards the attitude in which their philo- 
sophical schools stood as being a reaction against 
Arabism; but with diffidence I express an opposite 
opinion, believing that the doctrines maintained by 
them were the necessary extension of the fundament- 
al dogma of their faith, that there is but one God. 

That extension of their dogma was destined to 
shake Europe to its centre. Asserting the omnipres- 
ence of God, they affirmed that all human souls had 
emanated from him, and were destined to return ul- 
timately to him, as a drop of water vaporized from 
the sea, though it may pass through a thousand vicis- 
situdes, is pressed by an inevitable destiny, and soon- 
er or later returns to the sea again. They developed 
these ideas into a vast system, distinguished by the 
vigor of its conceptions and the acuteness of its rea- 
soning. It is needless to particularize the details of 
that system. Its general tendency may be gathered 
from a few of its doctrines and sentiments. 

From the cardinal idea of Mohammedanism they 
therefore affirmed that the important doctrine of 
the Indestructibility and Conservation of Force, and 
its necessary consequence, the Unity of human souls, 
arose. They were the authors of the so-called mod- 
ern theory of development, anticipating the most re- 

N 



194 MOHAMMEDAN PHILOSOPHY. 

cent writers on that subject in many of its details. 
Carrying the Fatalism of their creed into their philos- 
ophy — and it is such incidents as these that persuade 
me that they were not in antagonism to Arabism — 
they first give expression to that portentous maxim, 
" What can be, is." The adoption of such opinions 
bore, of course, at once on the great truth of the final 
accountability of man, making him an unresisting 
agent. In a scientific point of view that maxim was 
carried out to its consequences, as against the doctrine 
known as that of final causes. In the luxurious and 
splendid society of Spain such sentiments met a ready 
acceptance. Listen to what one of their most power- 
ful writers says : he is co-ordinating the grand views 
of Aristotle on the world of living things, with the 
Fatalism of Mohammed: "There is an eternal sea of 
Being, on the surface of which play the oscillating 
and variable ripples of individuality. God deals with 
the general laws of the universe, not with individuals. 
He recognizes the ocean, not its waves." Interpreting 
the abstract doctrines of Aristotle by the light of 
their natural faith, they were thus brought at once to 
the self-indulgence of Epicurus and the doubt of 
Pyrrho. They said, " Permit all things, believe noth- 
ing." They professed that their conception of a per- 
fect civil state is merely this : " It is that which re- 
quires neither a physician nor a judge." 

These statements may convey an idea of the condi- 



AVERROISM. 195 

tion to which philosophy had come, not only among 
the Spanish Arabs, but also among those of Asia. 
The real birthplace of these opinions was Bagdad. 
From thence they ramified over all the Mohammedan 
world. Of their writers, the most celebrated was 
Averroes. Let us now see what were the conse- 
quences of these things in Europe. 

It was during the pontificate of Innocent III., 
about the year 1200, that the Mendicant orders were 
established in the Koman Church. The course of 
ages had brought an unintelligibility into public wor- 
ship. Latin, like an old dialect, had become obsolete; 
the modern languages were forming. Among those 
classes, daily increasing in numbers, whose minds 
were awakening, an earnest desire for instruction was 
arising. Multitudes were crowding to hear philo- 
sophical discourses in the universities, and heresy was 
spreading very fast. But it was far from being con- 
fined to the intelligent. The lower orders furnished 
heretics and fanatics too. To antagonize the labors 
of these zealots, who, if they had been permitted to go 
on unchecked, would quickly have disseminated their 
doctrines through all classes of society, the Dominican 
and Franciscan orders were founded. They were well 
adapted to their duty. It was their business to move 
among the people, preaching to them in their own 
tongue wherever an audience could be collected. 

A very few years were needed to change totally 



196 AVERROISM. 

the aspect of the mendicant orders. No longer rope- 
bound, starving zealots, they became the most learned 
men in Europe, filling the chief professorships in the 
universities. They plunged deeply into the myste- 
ries of Averroism, and were soon divided into parties. 
The Dominicans were animated with the fiercest ha- 
tred against the Arabs, denouncing them as infidel 
Epicureans ; the Franciscans took the opposite side, 
and holding, for the time, control of the University 
of Paris, made it a focus of Averroism. It would be 
in vain to attempt to give an adequate conception of 
the scholastic disputations that arose. Wherever 
there was a monastery, there was a furious debate. 
Italy quickly became involved. Commercial prosper- 
ity had concentrated in Venice immense wealth. She 
had a powerful aristocratic class, and in that high so- 
ciety, as it had been in the high society of Spain, 
Averroism became fashionable. It held fast its ground 
all through the north of Italy. In a letter from Co- 
lumbus, dated Hayti, October, 1498, he says: "Aver- 
roes is one of the writers who has made me divine 
the existence of the New World." That remark as- 
sures us that, in common with the progressive men of 
his time, the Great Admiral was familiar with the 
views of the Spanish Mohammedan. They were now 
beginning to produce important physical results, and 
preparing the way for that scientific school soon to 
be made glorious by the discoveries of Galileo, Torri- 



INFLUENCE OF AVERROISM IN EUROPE. 107 

celli, and the Florentines. The proud fabric of mod- 
ern science, the prodigies of modern industry, our vast 
manufactures, came from this source. 

In vain the Koman authorities, appreciating the 
whole state of the case, forbade the reading of the 
physical works of Aristotle in the University of 
Paris. The contagion broke out nearer home in the 
University of Padua, stimulated and sustained by the 
wealthy people of Venice. It was clear that strenu- 
ous measures must be resorted to to abate the trou- 
ble. The Papal government took its course, and by 
the Lateran Council, under Leo X., the formal con- 
demnation of the philosophy of Averroes was pro- 
nounced. 

But whoever is familiar with the writings of the 
Italian statesmen will trace to this source the max- 
ims of policy indicated by them ; and those maxims, 
spreading from Italy, where they had long been in 
use, became the secret principles of diplomacy all 
over Europe. It is only in much more recent times 
that they have been supplanted by purer and more 
honorable means. 

Such is the progress, and such, often, the power of 
an Idea. From the mind in which it first originated 
it may spread, until at last, physically and intellect- 
ually, whole continents may be involved. It is use- 
less, then, to say that ideas have no force. In truth, 
they govern the world. A tide of human intelligence 



198 INFLUENCE OF AKABIAN IDEAS. 

followed the movement of the Arabian Crescent as a 
watery tide in the sea follows the motion of the moon. 
It may be that some of the results in the particular 
instance we have been considering are of a kind to 
meet our disapproval ; but it is with their force, not 
with their goodness or evil, that we are concerned. 
. See how that dogma which obtruded itself on the 
disturbed fancy of an enthusiastic Arab in his tent, 
and haunted him like something supernatural — a dog- 
ma in part consisting of an everlasting truth known 
from the old times, and in part of a fiction never heard 
of before — gradually forced its way, overthrowing em- 
pires and remodeling societies! Think not that it 
made its way by the aid of the sword alone. The 
sword may for a moment change an acknowledged 
national creed, but it can not affect the consciences 
of men. Profound though its argument be, something 
far more profound is demanded to produce results 
such as have been occupying our attention. 

The idea was suitable to the times, and to the con- 
dition of those to whom it was addressed. There lay 
the secret of its rapid spread — its intrinsic force on 
one hand, opportunity on the other. 

Arabian history thus gives a most striking instance 
of the impelling power of an Idea. No better exam- 
ple of the resisting j>ow r er of an Idea can be furnished 
than that afforded by Israelitish history. Ideas have 
a passive as well as an active political force. 



THE JEWS. 199 

What is it that, after more than twenty centuries 
of conquest, subjugation, and persecution — after ex- 
posure to all the allurements of idolatry and all the 
fascinations of philosophy — after transportation to 
every country under the sun — what is it that has 
kept this Asiatic people an undestroyed nation? 
Their idea of a Messiah or a Deliverer. 

In the earlier periods of their history the Jewish 
people had continually shown a disposition to fall 
into the idolatries of the surrounding nations. Even 
under the eyes of their lawgiver they resumed in the 
desert the adoration of Apis, which they had learned 
in Egypt, and animal worship is but a step removed 
from Fetichism. The Syrian tribes among whom they 
were subsequently thrown had already passed to the 
more elevated form of star -worship, Baal and the 
crescent-horned Astarte, the sun and the moon, being 
their principal divinities. It was with difficulty that 
the rulers and prophets of Israel reclaimed them from 
their perpetual backslidings to these idolatries. 

So long as the Jews maintained themselves as a 
compact and independent nation, these idolatrous 
lapses can only be regarded as transient maladies 
from which they easily recovered. But very differ- 
ent was it after the conquest of Jerusalem by Nebu- 
chadnezzar and the carrying of the people into cap- 
tivity. To the multitude, who had ever shown a dis- 
position to adopt the idea of the corporealization of 



200 MAGIANISM. 

God, and who had estimated the weakness or power 
of cities in warfare with their enemies by the weak- 
ness or power of their tutelary deities rather than by 
their military resources, the ruin of the Temple and 
the downfall of the Priesthood was a moral blow the 
force of which we can scarcely estimate. Their com- 
pulsory residence in Assyria established with that 
country connections and relationships which, so far 
from ending with the nominal restoration of the na- 
tion to its ancient seats, continued throughout their 
entire subsequent history, even after the final destruc- 
tion of Jerusalem by the Romans. In Persia they 
learned Magianism. To that form of Religion, em- 
braced, undoubtedly, the more readily because of the 
shock their own faith had sustained, Ave must impute 
all those novelties they exhibit after their return from 
captivity. Its philosophical aspect might even rec- 
ommend it to the more intellectual among them. In 
one essential point it offered a correspondence to the 
Hebrew doctrine forbidding the worship of God un- 
der any graven image or form. Asserting the exist- 
ence of one Great First Cause, it placed beneath him 
two subordinate powers, metaphorically set forth as 
Light and Darkness. It explained the co-existence 
of good and evil in the world on the principle that 
wherever there is brightness there must be shadow. 
It presented an impersonation of these powers in Or- 
musd, the Prince of Glory, and in Ahriman, or Satan, 



MAGIANISM. 201 

the embodiment of Evil or Darkness, beneath whom 
there were marshaled respectively armies of angels 
and daemons. Originally Satan was created pure, but, 
becoming envious of the glory of Ormuscl,he was pre- 
cipitated into the abyss. Between these dual divini- 
ties an unceasing warfare was waged. And since the 
First Cause w^as far removed from all material things, 
incapable of being approached even by man, it was 
needful that there should be a mediator. Ormusd, 
the principle of benevolence and light, had created 
man in a state of purity and virtue ; while Ahriman, 
the principle of evil and darkness, continually sought 
his destruction. In the last day of this conflict, when 
Ahriman is conquered and cast into darkness, the 
children of light who have been saved will enter into 
eternal glory. Not only is the soul of man immortal, 
but there is for the good a resurrection from the dead. 
The punishment of Ahriman is not, however, to be 
eternal : he will be purified in a Purgatory with tor- 
ments of fire. The Magians admitted angelic influ- 
ences under visible forms, and accepted the idea of 
Incarnation. They recognized the necessity of a tan- 
gible form of worship for the illiterate, and hence set 
forth, as emblems of Ormusd, Fire, Light, the Sun, to 
which devotions might be paid. 

Magianism therefore presented a complete and con- 
sistent religious scheme very different from the frag- 
mentary mythology of Europe, which offered no per- 



202 EFFECT OF MAGIANISM ON THE HEBKEWS. 

vading idea. So far as its doctrine of a First Cause 
is concerned, it approached, as has been said, to the 
Israelitish conception. It dealt with the great moral 
problem of the existence of evil in the world. It had 
a Principle of Good and of Evil, a mechanism of An- 
gels and Daemons. It contemplated man as being ex- 
posed in this life continually to the wiles of the Devil. 
It included the idea of a Mediator between God and 
man ; it asserted the immortality of the human soul, 
and a state of future rewards and punishments. Its 
ritual has descended to us in the " Zendavesta," or 
" Oracles of Life," said to be a revelation from Ormusd. 
Before the Babylonian captivity the Jews seem to 
have entertained corporeal views of the nature of 
God, and not to have accepted the doctrine of a fu- 
ture life, but looked for rewards and punishments ex- 
clusively in this. They did not admit a resurrection 
from the Dead. But, after that event, many of the 
doctrines of the Magians are plainly to be seen in 
their religious belief; and, indeed, upon one of the 
more prominent of them, the great national schism be- 
tween the Pharisees and Sadducees arose. The lat- 
ter, assuming the air of an elevated philosophy, pre- 
tending to lift themselves above vulgar ideas, alto- 
gether rejected the articles of the existence of angels, 
the immortality of the soul, and of the future state. 
It has been the fortune of Magianism, on two occa- 
sions, to affect powerfully the Monotheism of the 



LATER MAGIAN EFFECTS. 203 

West; once in thus completely modifying the He- 
brew faith by imparting to it many new ideas, and 
again, in the early ages of Christianity, by amalga- 
mating itself therewith, and giving origin to the varied 
forms of Gnosticism. Not only were Syria, Asia Mi- 
nor, and Egypt filled with pseudo - Magian sects, but 
a permanent impression was imparted to the subse- 
quent Catholic form. Of this, any one may be satis- 
fied who compares the state of Christianity in the first 
century with that in the tenth, aiding himself in his 
examination by the acknowledged Magian creed. It 
is an interesting circumstance that the Catholic au- 
thorities charge the earlier Reformers with Magian 
tendencies under the forms of Manichaeism. Thus 
the Albigenses, in the latter part of the twelfth cen- 
tury, the Waldenses, the Vaudois, the Picards, the Pe- 
trobrusians, are placed under that stigma. 

The co-existence of conflicting ideas in the same re- 
ligion may arise not only from conquest, when one 
caste is holding another in subjugation, but also in a 
society truly homogeneous, so far as origin is concern- 
ed, but which, in its progress, has become decomposed 
into two portions — a thinking class, and a class which 
is absorbed in the cares of supporting animal exist- 
ence. With national development the number and 
influence of the first class steadily increases, and in 
the end it exercises a regulating political power. 
Such a society, therefore, will always exhibit a tend- 



204 PHILOSOPHICAL PROGRESS OF THE HEBREWS. 

ency to philosophical progress in its religious views ; 
and if its condition is examined at intervals consider- 
ably apart, the advance that has been made is often 
very striking. Thus there can not be any doubt that 
among the ancient Israelites it was the current belief 
that Almighty God made his residence behind the 
veil of the Temple. In later times, when more noble 
and more worthy views of the divine nature were at- 
tained to, the same people could not possibly accept 
a doctrine expressing such a corporealization of God, 
and, with patriotic inconsistency, limited that occu- 
pancy to the time of the Temple of Solomon. Herein 
we see the effect of opinions originating in a more ad- 
vanced class of society, and gradually ascended to by 
a lower. They end in producing compromises, the in- 
consistency of which is excused because of the neces- 
sities of the case. 

Perhaps I may here be excused a passing remark 
on those venerable books constituting the Pentateuch, 
which not only serve as a guide to the daily life of 
Israel in all parts of the world, and are looked upon 
by Christendom with a sentiment of profound rever- 
ence, but which unhappily have been diverted from 
their original intent, and made to exert a most extra- 
ordinary, and, I will add, repressing influence on the 
advancement of scientific discovery. 

I think that whoever will read this portion of the 
Holy Scriptures with critical care, having first brought 



THE PENTATEUCH. 205 

his mind to a clear appreciation of the manners and 
opinions of the ancient Egyptians, and also of those 
of the Assyrians, will be forcibly drawn to the con- 
clusion that the author, or rather authors of these 
books, lived nearer to the banks of the Euphrates 
than to those of the Nile. If such an expression may 
with propriety be used, their literary aspect is Assyr- 
ian, not Egyptian. 

An author, even though inspired, must necessarily 
receive a tincture from the scenery, the time, the coim 
munity in which he lives. The images and expres- 
sions he uses will all accord with a certain style. In 
literary composition, as in painting, there is a style 
which makes itself obviously manifest to the critical 
eye. Nay, even the handwriting of a man is readily 
detected by those who are familiar with it, though it 
would be very difficult for them to say wherein the 
peculiarity consists. I repeat it — the style of this 
portion of the Inspired Volume is Asiatic, not African. 

For the sake of modern science, and of true religion 
too, it is deeply to be regretted that this interesting 
question can not be remitted to the state in which it 
was a century ago, when it was regarded, both by 
Christian and Jewish writers, as a point to be dealt 
with according to the rules of ordinary criticism, and 
not as a matter of sentiment. 

With diffidence I would suggest that the treatment 
of this question will probably demand a renewed and 



206 THE PENTATEUCH. 

critical examination of the authenticity of trie four- 
teenth chapter of the second book of Esdras, called 
apocryphal. It is desirable to know what it was 
that determined so many very ancient and very great 
ecclesiastical writers — Irenseus, Tertullian, Clemens 
Alexandrinus, Basil, Jerome, Augustine, Chrysostom 
— to accept the affirmations of that chapter as true. 
They lived much nearer the date of these events than 
we do ; perhaps they had more certain means to guide 
their judgment. They held that the original Penta- 
teuch was lost or destroyed in the Babylonian cap- 
tivity, and that the statement that Ezra is affirmed to 
make in the place above quoted must be received as 
accurate. 

That statement is to this effect : that the original 
books were burnt ; and that, for the purpose of fur- 
nishing a guide to the people, Ezra undertook to 
write all that had been done in the world from the 
beginning. 

To this end, he took five amanuenses, and secluded 
himself for forty days. In that time the books were 
written ; and the Most High ordered that the first 
portion of them should be published openly, that the 
worthy and the unworthy might read it. 

But the latter portion was to be reserved for the 
wise, for in them is the vein of understanding, and 
the fountain of wisdom, and the river of knowledge. 
And Ezra did as he was ordered to do. There were, 
then, esoteric and exoteric books. 



THE MESSIANIC IDEA. 207 

Ezra, a priest and Doctor of the Law, was a prison- 
er in Media in the reign of Artaxerxes I., king of 
Persia, B.C. 458. It may "be added, to connect the 
recollection of these events with European chronolo- 
gy, that they happened about the time that Themis- 
tocles put himself to death. 

To return from this digression : Persia imposed on 
the Jews an intellectual impression discoverable in all 
their subsequent history. It gave a special character- 
istic to their religious faith. Above all, on their re- 
turn to their native country they brought with them 
the idea that has imparted to them, in subsequent 
ages r indestructibility. In their captivity they had 
been witnesses of many great political events. They 
had seen their Babylonian desolator made desolate, 
their victor vanquished. It was in the uncertainties 
and sufferings of these events, when they hung their 
harps on the willows and wept when they remember- 
ed Zion, that the hope of a Deliverer first arose ; and 
in the greater calamities of after ages, this, which in 
the first instance was no more than a wished-for po- 
litical event, became a fixed religious expectation. 
Experience had shown them that in the fall and rise 
of great empires they had been preserved. It taught 
them to look with an inflexible faith through all the 
vicissitudes of the future. 

After the overthrow of the Persian Empire by 
Alexander the Great, the Jews were brought in con- 



208 HEBREW DEVELOPMENT. 

tact with a new intellectual disturbance — Greek phi- 
losophy. The Syrian Jews successfully resisted that 
influence ; the trifling approaches made to it were of 
a very transitory kind. Such outward manifestations 
as the race-course and gymnasia, that had been estab- 
lished, did not suit the genius of Jerusalem. But it 
was far otherwise with those Israelitish emigrants 
who had settled in Egypt. Under the favoring cli- 
mate of that country they became thoroughly Hellen- 
ized. Among them the philosojDhy of Plato found 
enthusiastic devotees, and through them the whole 
current of later European religious thought has been 
affected. 

As they had withstood Greek, so, too, they with- 
stood Roman influence. In vain Antiochus Epiph- 
anes, who had long lived in Rome, tried to bring 
about a change ; in vain succeeding princes renewed 
the attempt; the stubborn, stiff-necked people were 
as unyielding as adamant. The Pharisees, who con- 
stituted the patriotic party — Hebrews of the Hebrews 
— would have nothing to do with the Actions or phi- 
losophies of the West. They left that, with derision 
and detestation, to the infidel Sadducees. 

Still again ; when the Arabians overwhelmed by 
their military conquests Asia and Africa, though the 
Jew in one sense affiliated with the victorious intru- 
der, in another, with an inborn instinct, he kept him- 
self separate. The Syrian branch of the family, with 



HEBREW DEVELOPMENT. 209 

its immovable austerities, had yielded in importance 
to the Egyptian : it had been more than decimated by 
the bitterness of Roman subjugation, both Pagan and 
Christian ; but the Egyptian Israelite, though declin- 
ing the forms of Mecca, gave his hand to the Saracen. 
They found a point of harmony in the great doctrine 
of the oneness of God. From this alliance both par- 
ties took benefit : the Arab gained philosophy, and 
the Jew j)olitical influence. Conjointly they forced 
upon Europe its chief modern characteristic — scien- 
tific advancement. 

Not until the Syrian Jew had become modified by 
migrating to other countries did his character change. 
So long as he was in the chosen land, he was ever the 
same unyielding fanatic. He had no conception of 
art, either as expressed by painting or statuary. In 
possession of what he considered to be a supernatural 
revelation, it was impossible that literature should 
prosper with him, or even receive the smallest encour- 
agement. His profound belief in signs and wonders 
was incompatible with science, and accordingly noth- 
ing deserving of that name existed in his nation. 

But his mind as well as his sky changed when he 
migrated to other countries. He became great among 
the greatest in all these manifestations of the highest 
results of human civilization. 

Scattered all over the world, Israel still, as a peo- 
ple, exists. Go where we will, we may always find 

O 



210 HEBREW DEVELOPMENT. 

its patriarchal graybeard, when all other earthly ob- 
jects and pursuits are passing away 7 sitting in hourly 
expectation of an annunciation of the Messiah. It is 
that, and no miracle, which, through the wreck of na- 
tions and the extinction of men, has given to the Jew 
immortality. He lives through the force of an idea. 

I can not close these remarks better than by quot- 
ing a passage of profound import from the learned 
author of the " Etudes d'Histoire Eeligieuse :" 

" If, finally, we put to ourselves this question, Has 
Israel fulfilled its calling? has it, in the grand min- 
gling of nations, kept the post that w^as originally in- 
trusted to it ? we reply without hesitation, Yes. Is- 
rael has been the stem on which the faith of the hu- 
man race has been grafted. No people has taken its 
destiny so seriously as Israel ; none has felt so vivid- 
ly its joys and its sorrows as a nation ; none has lived 
more thoroughly for an idea, Israel has vanquished 
Time, and made use of all its oppressors. The day 
when a false report caused us to celebrate one year 
too soon the taking of Sebastopol, an old Polish Jew, 
who spends his clays in the Imperial Library, absorb- 
ed in reading the dusty manuscripts of his nation, 
greeted me with this quotation from Isaiah: 'Is it 
fallen, is it fallen, Babylon V The victory of the Al- 
lies, as he saw it, was but the chastisement for vio- 
lence practiced on his co-religionists by the man whom 
he called the Nebuchadnezzar and the Antiochus of 



THE CONQUEST OF NATURE. 211 

our time. In that sad old man I seemed to see before 
me the living genius of that indestructible people. 
Over every ruin it has clapped its hands ; persecuted 
by all men, on all men it has been avenged. For this 
it has needed but one quality — a quality which, how- 
ever, man gives not to himself — endurance. It is by 
this that it has brought to pass the boldest predic- 
tions of its prophets. The world that despised it has 
come round to it. Jerusalem at this present hour is 
truly c a house of prayer for all nations,' equally ven- 
erated by Jew, by Christian, by Mussulman." 

These instances of the political force of Ideas in the 
case of the Arabians and the Israelites may serve as 
an introduction to the consideration of that grander 
idea under which modern civilization is evolving; it 
is, that man can comprehend Nature, and subjugate 
physical agents to his use. 

A most audacious conception — the conquest of Na- 
ture ! Like other grand ideas, it has slowly emerged 
from small beginnings and is steadily forcing its way. 
Kesisted by influences that have gathered around 
them in the course of centuries political power, it has 
overthrown many and confronts the rest. Modern 
Europe is fast submitting herself to its rule. 

It first formally appeared in the writings of Aris- 
totle, and gained strength through the events conse- 
quent on the Asiatic campaign of Alexander the 



212 THE CONQUEST OF NATURE. 

Great. Under the auspices of the Ptolemies, who 
founded in Alexandria institutions for its encourage- 
ment, it received a marked development, and would 
probably have modified the aspect of human affairs, 
had it not been for the founding of the Byzantine 
Empire. 

For it so fell out that the political position of Con- 
stantine the Great and his successors was incompati- 
ble with the protection of science, the knowledge of 
Nature. Those sovereigns placed themselves in in- 
flexible opposition to it ; and to the last, when they 
were overthrown by the Turks, used whatever power 
they had for its destruction. The policy they thus 
adopted became incorporated with the ecclesiastical 
system they represented, and, though with diminish- 
ed force, it has descended to our times. 

But it was not in Constantinople alone that events 
took this unhappy course. Papal Borne, through her 
ancient connection with the Byzantine policy, became 
in like manner committed ; and her ecclesiastical in- 
fluence, reaching even through the Beformation, still 
acts adversely on the investigation of Nature and 
against the free propagation of thought. 

So far as Europe has found relief from this intel- 
lectual oppression, her deliverance has come through 
those people to whose history I have been referring 
— the Arabians and the Jews. Modern Science as 
well as modern Industry is their creation. 



THE CONQUEST OF NATURE. 213 

I now propose to devote a few pages to a partial 
illustration of what has been done toward obtaining 
a true knowledge of Nature, and the subjugation of 
physical agents to the use of man. But, though I 
were to increase by many times the space I can de- 
vote to this topic, I must necessarily leave it in a 
very imperfect, and therefore unsatisfactory condition. 
So vast is the body of information accumulated, that 
it exceeds the capacity of any one book, and trans- 
cends the understanding of any one man. 

But, though imperfect in that respect, this sketch 
will be sufficient to give emphasis to the proposition 
I intend to rest upon it — that a Nation which is pre- 
paring itself for sovereignty among the powers of the 
earth must shake off the traditions of obsolete policy, 
and stand forth the defender and protector of free 
thought. 

The process of attaining correct views of Nature 
has been marked by a continual decline of the myste- 
rious and supernatural. 

In the beginning of social as well as of individual 
life, the appearance of things is accepted as a reality. 
The blue concave of the sky seems to be a roof to the 
earth, separating it from higher and serener regions 
beyond. In old times they thought that it might be 
frozen air in which stars had been imbedded, and be- 
neath which the sun and moon, made for the purpose 



214 THE ATMOSPHERE. 

of giving light to man, performed their daily rising 
and setting. This crystalline firmament parted the 
world of waters above from the earthly world of wa- 
ters below. It was also the floor of heaven. The 
poets exhausted their imagination in depicting the 
splendors of this empyrean abode, the habitation of 
celestial beings and of the immortal gods. 

Not, then, without surprise does man assure him- 
self that he can not trust his eyes ; that the sky is 
only an illusion ; and that for distances infinite in his 
appreciation there is nothing but space and stars. 

The atmosphere is then a shell of gas, or rather a 
mixture of gases, enveloping the earth. It does not 
extend indefinitely, but its limit is reached at a height 
of less than fifty miles. Though in one sense invisi- 
ble, and supposed in the old times to be altogether 
of a spiritual nature, it is now known to have weight 
like other material things, and therefore to exert 
pressure. On every square inch of the surface upon 
which it rests it bears with a pressure of about fifteen 
pounds. 

Fifty miles it extends upward, becoming thinner 
and thinner, and at that distance it ends. But to the 
earth's centre there are nearly four thousand miles. 
So, if we compare the earth with the atmosphere, they 
bear about the same proportion to each other that a 
peach does to the down that covers it. The color of 
the sky is the blue tint of oxygen gas, one of the 
chief ingredients of the air. 



NATURE OF GASES. 215 

Besides oxygen there are a great many other aerial 
substances in the atmosphere, for it must necessarily 
be the receptacle of every vaporous substance formed 
on the earth. To such substances the designation of 
gases has been given, because until recent times they 
were considered to be of a spiritual character: the 
word gas is a corruption of geist or ghost. It was 
generally thought that these principles could take on 
a bodily form : that they secreted themselves, like 
genii or apparitions, in pits and caves, suffocating la- 
borers who intruded on their privacy : in mines they 
guarded treasures. There was abundant evidence 
that they had often been seen in such solitary places 
as dwarfs of grotesque appearance, with leathery ears 
hanging clown to their shoulders, and clad in gar- 
ments of gray cloth. 

But we can not altogether rely on human testimo- 
ny, no matter how copious or respectable it may be. 
Men now generate gases in glass retorts, collect them 
in bell jars, fasten them up in bottles, analyze them, 
combine them with one another. They have no spir- 
itual qualities ; they are only matter. 

Composed of such ingredients, the air presses on 
the body of every man with a weight of thirty thou- 
sand pounds ; yet, wonderful to be said, we do not 
feel it. Its particles adhere so lightly to each other 
that motions are very easily established in it, and 
hence arise breezes and tempests. The swiftness and 



216 METEOROLOGY. 

destrnctiveness of the latter may impress us with an 
idea that they are of a supernatural origin; but the 
poetic angel, who 

"Rides in the whirlwind and directs the storm," 

is, in truth, the warmth of the sun. This warmth, ex- 
panding the lower strata of the atmosphere, establish- 
es upward currents, which, influenced by the rotation 
of the earth on her axis, produce the trade winds that 
blow eternally in the tropical seas, or, by neutralizing 
one another, give rise to the tropical calms. On sim- 
ilar physical principles are explained land and sea 
breezes: they are due to the alternate warming and 
cooling of the land. The monsoons of the Indian 
Ocean are traced to the heating of the continents of 
Africa and Asia alternately. Tornadoes are discs of 
air whirling round a vertical or somewhat inclined 
axis, which is carried forward with the storm. In 
days of old the mariner offered sacrifices to iEolus 
and Neptune, the gods of the winds and the sea, to 
preserve his ship from foundering; but now he ob- 
serves his barometer, and, relying on the published 
theory of hurricanes, finds safety for himself by sail- 
ing out of their way. 

Meteorology, less advanced than many other of the 
sciences, has not yet freed itself completely from the 
supernatural. The rainy and the dry seasons, the 
trade winds and calms of the tropics, have been sue- 



NATURE OF SOUNDS. 217 

cessfully referred to physical causes and clearly ex- 
plained. In temperate climates there is so ranch ap- 
parent irregularity, that vicissitudes of the weather 
seem hardly to take place in the necessities of the 
case and in an inevitable way. But in what parallel 
of latitude is it that physical agencies end and super- 
natural ones begin ? Men have not yet clearly learn- 
ed that the course of Nature will never be changed at 
their entreaty • they do not yet understand that their 
business is, by exercising the reason that has been 
given them, to attain foreknowledge of coming events, 
and arrange their affairs accordingly. 

Besides the obvious and sometimes violent move- 
ments in the air, there are others of an invisible kind. 
They are connected with sounds. The ancients feign- 
ed that Echo, a nymph who was the daughter of Aer 
and Tellus, indulging in an unrequited love, pined 
away until nothing was left but her voice, which still 
may be heard in rocky solitudes and unfrequented 
places, once her familiar haunts. 

But sounds are only motion. Two things are need- 
ful for their perception — vibrating particles to origin- 
ate, and an elastic medium to convey them. Perhaps 
it may seem wonderful that the air, which is common- 
ly that medium, though permitting the onward rush 
of a sound at a rate of 1089 feet in a second, is itself 
so nearly motionless that not even the motes floating 
in the sunbeam are disturbed by it, nor the ascending 



218 NATURE OF SOUNDS. 

smoke of a chimney that the feeblest breeze could 
dissipate. That wonder may, however, cease, when 
we recall what we have seen when a long cord tied 
at one end is shaken up and down at the other; 
waves run along it, though the cord keeps its place : 
or when, in the harvest season, the wind presses on 
the ripe ears, imparting to them a bowing motion, un- 
dulations pass swiftly across the field : it is only a 
phantom-form that is moving. And so with the air ; 
a wave-like form rushes through it, though it is in re- 
ality motionless in its mass. 

According as the vibrating body varies its quick- 
ness of movement, the note emitted by it changes. 
The number of times it must beat back and forth to 
produce a given note has been ascertained by many 
curious experiments. It may be as low as 32 or as 
high as 24,000 in a second. Two sounds encounter- 
ing one another may give rise, as one would antici- 
pate, to an increased effect ; but they may also total- 
ly neutralize one another, producing absolute silence, 
and that, no matter how loud they may have been : 
they are said to interfere. The mechanism of that 
interference is understood. 

To produce the sounds that are necessary for inter- 
communication among the higher animals, and partic- 
ularly the speech of man, it might be supposed that 
some complicated and elaborate contrivance must 
needs be resorted to. This object is, however, accom- 



THE SEA. 219 

plished by merely employing, on its escape from the 
system, the wasted product of respiration, the breath, 
which, as it issues outward through the respiratory 
passages, sets in motion a simple mechanism, and 
thereby originates all the exquisite modulations of 
song and all the impressive utterances of speech. Is 
it not admirable, that thus out of dead and apparent- 
ly useless matter results of so high an order, material- 
ly and mentally, are obtained ? 

Are not all the inventions of musical notation and 
alphabetical writing admirable? They enable man 
to reproduce sounds and their predetermined succes- 
sion, thereby rekindling sentimental feeling, and con- 
veying knowledge from one generation to another. 

From the atmosphere and its phenomena we may 
turn to the sea. It covers nearly three fourths of the 
earth's surface, and seems to be a fitting emblem of 
omnipotence and infinity. Dealing with it as we have 
dealt with the air, and referring it to the dimensions 
of the earth, we find that it is nothing more than a 
mere film resting in shallow cavities on the surface 
of the earth. The varnish that covers a globe repre- 
sents its relative size not inadequately. 

The color of the sea varies very much at different 
times and in different localities. It exhibits shades 
of red, green, and blue, its particular tint depending 
on the aspect of the sky or clouds — sometimes on 'the 



220 THE SEA. 

color of its "bed, sometimes on the condition of the wa- 
ter itself, as affected by turbidity or by the presence 
of an infinite number of small aquatic animals, certain 
species of which often make it phosphorescent by 
night. Its temperature is different in different lati- 
tudes, though a complete correspondence in this re- 
spect is not to be anticipated, on account of the facility 
with which currents are established in it, analogous 
to winds in the atmosphere. Making due allowance 
for this, it may be said that its surface temperature 
varies from about 85° in the torrid zone to the freez- 
ing point in the Polar Sea. From the circumstance 
of its containing so much saline matter, its specific 
gravity is greater than that of pure water : at the 
equator it is 1.028. This density necessarily varies 
with the rate at which superficial evaporation under 
the influence of the sun is taking place. As the at- 
mosphere is a general receptacle for gases and vapors 
disengaged from the earth, so the sea is a general re- 
ceptacle for soluble matter discharged into it by riv- 
ers. Among such substances common salt greatly 
predominates : it constitutes more than three fourths 
of the entire solid amount. 

In the same manner in which it establishes cur- 
rents in the air by occasioning expansion, solar heat 
likewise gives rise to currents in the sea. In this in- 
stance, however, the action is not of so purely physi- 
cal a kind as in the other, for a chemical change taking 



OCEANIC CURRENTS. 221 

place indirectly modifies the result. This chemical 
change is an evaporation of pure water, which leaves 
the sea a more concentrated salt solution than before. 
Its effect is therefore in some degree to counteract the 
expansion of the water by warmth; for the sun -rays 
being able to penetrate several feet below the sur- 
face, correspondingly raise the temperature of that 
portion, which expands and becomes lighter; but, 
simultaneously, surface evaporation tends to make 
the water heavier. Notwithstanding this, in a gen- 
eral way currents are established, answering to winds 
in the air. Of these the Gulf Stream is the most in- 
teresting example. 

The mechanical action of the sun-rays in occasion- 
ing currents is thus effected through the expansion 
of the water, of which the warm portions ascend to 
the surface, colder portions from beneath setting in 
to supply their place. These currents, both hot and 
cold, are of course affected by the diurnal rotation of 
the earth, the action being, in principle, the same as 
that occurring in the winds. They exert so great an 
influence as conveyers of heat, as to disturb the ordi- 
nary climate relations depending on the sun's position. 

But not only as a liquid does water exist; it can 
assume other forms, becoming solid in ice and aerial 
in steam. In what does the difference of these states 
consist ? Ordinary experience must at all times have 
indicated that these changes depend on temperature ; 



222 THE STEAM-ENGINE. 

but it was not until the last century that the true re- 
lation was distinctly made out. The intrinsic differ- 
ence between water and ice is this, that water con- 
tains about 140 degrees of heat more than ice, and 
that this heat is imperceptible to the thermometer. 
"When, therefore, ice turns into water, the 140 degrees 
of heat must be imparted, and when water turns into 
ice they must be taken away. Moreover, the intrin- 
sic difference between water and its vapor, or steam, 
is this; that though they may be at the same tem- 
perature, steam contains about 1000 degrees of heat 
more than water, which large amount — enough, in- 
deed, to make a solid body red hot — is altogether im- 
perceptible by the thermometer. When water turns 
into steam these thousand degrees of heat must be 
furnished, and when steam is condensed into water 
they must be taken away. This discovery was not 
only of importance scientifically, it was also connect- 
ed with the great invention of the last century — the 
steam-engine, which has revolutionized the industry 
of the world. 

"What has not that invention done for America? 
At this moment it more than doubles our laboring 
population, it makes available our vast river system, 
and in the railway binds the most distant parts of 
the Nation together. "What would this continent 
have been if we had possessed no cheaper and better 
sources of power than that of animals, or of falling 



COMPOSITION OF WATER. 223 

water, or of the wind ? The application of an appa- 
rently abstruse fact connected with latent heat, and 
the relations of vapors and liquids to one another, has 
been essentially necessary to the development of our 
Western civilization. 

The invention of the steam-engine was followed 
by the discovery of the compound nature of water. 
From the most primitive times that liquid had been 
considered to be a simple undecomposable body. It 
was one of the four elements of antiquity. But soon 
after the discovery of two very important gases, Oxy- 
gen and Hydrogen, a suspicion that it is composed of 
them began to be entertained. The invention of the 
Voltaic battery finally and decisively settled that 
point, the compound nature of water being placed be- 
yond contradiction. There can be no exaggeration 
of the importance of this discovery. It may be af- 
firmed to have been the starting-point of the wonder- 
ful development of modern chemistry. 

The suns heat causes evaporation to take place 
from the entire surface of the sea, but to a different 
degree in different latitudes. In the torrid zone, 
where the heat is greatest, the quantity thus raised 
is a maximum, and from that region the amount de- 
clines north and south toward the poles. It is to be 
understood that the water thus vaporized is pure, and 
contains no saline matter. In consequence of this 
different degree of vaporization, it necessarily follows 



224 EVAPORATION. 

that the percentage of salt is greatest at the equator, 
and there the specific gravity would be very much 
higher were it not for the more elevated temperature. 
As to the nature of evaporation, the earlier chemists 
imagined that it was altogether due to atmospheric 
agency, the air dissolving more moisture as its tem- 
perature is higher. 

In the Patristic philosophy it was supposed that 
the quantity of water in the sea was once far greater 
than at present, sufficient, indeed, to overflow the 
mountains, but that it had been removed and the 
land dried by the agency of a wind. The quantity 
of material substance on the globe has never dimin- 
ished; it is the same now as it was in the begin- 
ning. Such a diminution could not take place with- 
out causing an alteration in the length of the year. 
Evaporation is due not to the agency of the air, but 
to heat, heat alone determining the quantity of vapor 
that can exist in a given space, that quantity being 
the same whether the space is a void or already oc- 
cupied by other gases. If the temperature rises, the 
amount of vapor that can exist in such a space in- 
creases; if the temperature declines, it diminishes. 
All this is dependent on the fact that the elastic force 
of a vapor increases with its temperature, and that for 
every temperature there is a density for the vapor 
which can not be exceeded without liquefaction en- 
suing. This point is known as that of maximum 



CLOUDS. 225 

density. It was by a thorough comprehension of the 
principles herein involved that Watt was led to in- 
vent the low-pressure steam-engine, in which he ac- 
complished the apparently paradoxical result of con- 
densing the steam without cooling the cylinder. 

Thus there is raised from the sea and from the 
damp surface of the land a quantity of fresh water, 
every day, answering to the supply of solar heat. It 
rises in the warm current, ascending in a perfectly in- 
visible state, retaining that condition until it comes to 
regions the temperature of which is low enough to 
surpass the point of maximum density and occasion 
condensation. As this takes place in the upper stra- 
ta, the liquid water, as it forms, is in globules of per- 
haps ™m °f an mcn m s i ze - Their misty aggregate is 
a cloud. 

Clouds, while thus floating in the air, if their di- 
mensions are not too great, so as to overshadow the 
canopy, become beautiful objects as reflectors of the 
sun's light, and thus borrowing tints and brilliancy 
from his rays. They may either dissolve away by 
coming into warmer or dryer spaces, or their minute 
spherules, coalescing together, may descend to the 
ground as rain. Water descending as rain is per- 
haps the purest offered to us by nature, yet it is far 
from being chemically pure. The rain-drops dissolve 
out of the air portions of its various gaseous ingredi- 
ents, and become especially contaminated by dust and 

P 



226 RAIN AND EFFECTS OF WATER. 

organic matter disseminated through it. Pnre water 
can only be obtained by careful distillation in vessels 
made of platinum, silver, or gold. 

Bain, falling on the earth, sinks through the pores 
and crevices to issue forth a^ain in certain localities 
as springs. Before the water thus emerges it has be- 
come still farther contaminated by dissolving what- 
ever soluble materials chance to be in its way. Each 
spring discharging its waters through a little branch, 
these successively coalesce with one another, forming 
streams larger and larger until they become a river. 
In that manner a section of country is drained through 
its lowlands and valleys, the river making its way 
down its incline, and eventually delivering its waters 
into the sea. Thus, by the heat of the sun and grav- 
itation conjointly, the water passes through a com- 
plete cycle. From the sea it arose, to the sea it inev- 
itably returns. 

But, though water thus derived from the sea re- 
turns thereto ultimately with inevitable certainty, a 
portion is intercepted and delayed in its course, to 
discharge very important offices in the mechanical and 
organic phenomena of the earth. 

As respects its mechanical functions, space would 
fail me if I were to consider them in detail, or to at- 
tempt to show how greatly, in its liquid state, water 
is the agent that modifies the surface of the globe. 
There falls not a drop of rain which does not disinte- 



AURORA AND LIGHTNING. 227 

grate and disturb portions of the soil ; there flows not 
a stream which does not carry solid matter into the 
sea. It is for geology to contemplate the amazing ag- 
gregate of detritus thus removed from continents, di- 
minishing their height and filling up the bed of the 
sea ; to consider the effects in colder climates arising 
from the freezing of water and the properties of ice 
in the act of solidification — the expansion tending to 
pulverize the soil effectually, as agriculturists well 
know. In such masses as glaciers and icebergs the 
mechanical effects are of no little scientific interest. 
The vaporous condition and changes from it are sub- 
jects which engross a large portion of meteorology ; 
for such events as the condensation of atmospheric 
moisture into rain, snow, hail, can not occur without 
enormous disturbances in the pressure and other re- 
lations of the air, giving rise to many imposing me- 
teorological events. 

But of all meteorological phenomena, undoubtedly 
the most surprising are the displays of atmospheric 
electricity. What can be more beautiful than the 
fantastic, the ever-changing movements of the Auro- 
ra ? what more imposing than the flash of lightning ? 
Not without reason have men in all ages looked upon 
the former as glimpses of the movements of angels, 
and upon the latter as being the weapon of God. 

Scientific discovery has not only removed these 
prodigies from the domain of the supernatural, it has 



228 ELECTRICAL DISCOVERIES. 

also made the agent concerned in their production 
available for the purposes of man. When Franklin, 
with a boy's kite, drew down the lightning from 
heaven, there was a great moral as well as physical 
result. Human opinions were modified, the power 
of man was increased. 

It is an illustration of the excellence and fertility 
of modern methods of investigation, that the phenom- 
ena of attraction displayed by amber, which had been 
known and neglected for two thousand years, subse- 
quently, in one tenth of that time, led to surprising 
consequences. First, it was shown that there are 
many other bodies which will act in like manner; 
then came the invention of the electrical machine; the 
discovery of electrical repulsion and the spark ; the 
differences of conductibility in bodies ; the two appar- 
ent species of electricity, vitreous and resinous ; the 
general law of attraction and repulsion ; the wonder- 
ful phenomena of the Leyden vial and the electric 
shock ; the demonstration of the identity of lightning 
and electricity; the means of protecting buildings 
and ships by rods ; the velocity of electric movement, 
immense distances being passed through in an inap- 
preciable time ; the theory of one fluid and that of 
two ; the mathematical discussion of all the phenom- 
ena, first on one and then on the other of those doc- 
trines ; the invention of the torsion balance ; the de- 
termination that the attractive and repulsive forces 



ELECTRICAL DISCOVERIES. 229 

followed the law of the inverse squares ; the condi- 
tions of distribution on conductors ; the elucidation 
of the phenomena of induction. At length, when dis- 
covery seemed to be pausing, the facts of galvanism 
were announced in Italy. Up to this time it was 
thought that the most certain sign of the death of an 
animal was its inability to exhibit muscular contrac- 
tion; but now it was shown that muscular move- 
ments could be excited in those that were dead and 
even mutilated. Then quickly followed the inven- 
tion of the Voltaic pile. Who could have believed 
that the twitching of a frog's leg, in the experiments 
of Galvani, would give rise, in a very few years, to 
the establishment beyond all question of the com- 
pound nature of water, separating its constituents 
from one another — would lead to the deflagration 
and dissipation, in a vapor, of metals that can hardly 
be melted in a furnace — would show that the solid 
earth we tread upon is an oxide — yield new metals 
light enough to swim upon water, and even seem to 
set it on fire — produce the most brilliant of all arti- 
ficial lights, rivaling, if not excelling, in its intolera- 
ble splendor the noontide sun — would occasion a 
complete revolution in chemistry, compelling that sci- 
ence to accept new ideas and even a new nomencla- 
ture — that it would give us the power of making 
magnets capable of lifting more than a ton, cast a 
light on that riddle of ages, the pointing of the mar- 



230 MAGNETIC DISCOVERIES. 

iner's compass north and south, and explain the mu- 
tual attraction or repulsion of magnetic needles — that 
it would enable us to form exquisitely in metal casts 
of all kinds of objects of art, and give workmen a 
means of performing gilding and silvering without 
risk to their health — that it would suggest to the 
evil disposed the forging of bank-notes, the sophisti- 
cating of jewelry, and be invaluable in the uttering 
of false coinage — that it w T ould carry the messages of 
commerce and friendship instantaneously across con- 
tinents or under oceans, and " waft a sigh from Indus 
to the Pole !" 

Yet that is only a part of what Galvani's experi- 
ment, carried out by modern methods, has actually 
done. Could there be a more brilliant instance of 
their power, a brighter earnest of the future of phys- 
ical philosophy ? 

The Venetians brought the use of the magnetic 
needle, for the purposes of navigation, from China. 
The properties of the loadstone had been known both 
in Europe and Asia from very remote times. It at- 
tracts pieces of iron, imparts its own qualities perma- 
nently to tempered steel, and, if floated on water or 
poised on a pivot, points north and south. 

This pointing, however, in most places is not accu- 
rate; there is a certain deviation or declination. 
When Columbus made his first voyage across the 
Atlantic, he found that there was a position about a 



THE WONDERS OF SCIENCE. 231 

hundred miles west of the Azores where the pointing 
was true. To the meridian passing through this 
place the designation of the line of no variation was 
given. The Papal government, considering this to be 
a natural boundary between the east and west hemi- 
spheres of the earth, made it the dividing-line be- 
tween the Spanish and Portuguese possessions. 

But, though it was subsequently ascertained that 
this adjudication was founded on a misconception, 
and that the line of no variation is unceasingly mov- 
ing, a surprising consequence followed — the circum- 
navigation of the earth. 

Science is full of wonders. The movements of a 
poised steel needle overthrew opinions that had been 
endorsed by the highest human authorities. It was 
no longer possible to maintain that the earth is a flat 
surface covered over with the dome of the sky; it was 
no longer possible to deny that it is a globe revolving 
round a central sun. 

A piece of rubbed amber attracts a straw: that lit- 
tle fact, thoroughly investigated, leads to the inven- 
tion of the electric telegraph, and men communicate 
w 7 ith one another instantaneously across continents 
and under the bottom of oceans. The sunshine com- 
ing through an angular fragment of glass produces 
a play of colors, and the rainbow, in the old times 
thought to be God's weapon resting against the 
clouds, is explained. A straight stick dipped into 



232 THE WONDERS OF SCIENCE. 

water seems as if it were broken, and it follows that 
we see the sun "before he has risen and after he has 
set — that, with the exception of the one that happens 
to be overhead, all the stars in the sky are imagined 
to be in places where in reality they are not. A ball 
of glass, if looked through, magnifies objects, a con- 
cave fragment diminishes them : that leads to the in- 
vention of spectacles, and the giving of sight to the 
blind. Some scratches on a polished piece of metal 
set in the sun-rays exhibit gaudy colors like a pea- 
cock's feather, and it follows that light added to light 
may produce total darkness. A bar of iron, cooled, 
becomes too small to occupy completely a sjDace it 
had previously filled, and therefore the apparent con- 
stancy in the size of familiar objects turns out to be a 
delusion : they are larger by day than they are by 
night, they are smaller in winter than in summer; 
and if a cloud passes over the sun all things in the 
shade diminish, but they regain their size as soon as 
his beams are restored. How wonderful is the Stereo- 
scope, through which, if we look at two flat pictures, 
we see but one, yet that stands out with an air of so- 
lidity and with the deception of perspective ! How 
wonderful the Microscoj)e, which enables us to dis- 
cern, in living specks that could creep through the 
eye of a needle, elaborate and complicated organs for 
respiration, for circulation, for digestion, as perfect as 
those of the elej)hant ! How wonderful the Telescope, 



OPPOSITION TO SCIENCE. 233 

which has revealed to us countless myriads of worlds 
in the abysses of space, and has forever destroyed the 
doctrine that the universe was made for man ! How 
wonderful the Spectroscope, which teaches us the ma- 
terial composition of those distant orbs, what metals, 
what gases they contain, and demonstrates to us the 
manner in which systems of worlds arise ! 

But it is in vain to go on. I remarked, a few pages 
back, that the facts of science exceed the capacity of 
any one book. It is in vain to attempt to do justice 
to the vast accumulation, in vain to try to set forth 
the importance of that glorious monument to the in- 
tellect of man. 

Why is it that in Europe the doctrines connected 
with these facts, instead of being welcomed with de- 
light, have had to fight their way % Why is it that 
those who have revealed them suffer obloquy, in some 
instances have suffered death ? 

Why should men be angry when they are told that 
the sky is not an empyrean floor, but only an optical 
deception, there being nothing but space and stars be- 
yond us ; that the earth is not a flat and immovable 
plate, but a swiftly rushing globe ; that the rising 
and setting of the sun and the moon are all a delu- 
sion ; that there are people on the other side of the 
earth whose feet are planted toward ours ; that the 
world was not made yesterday, but is myriads of cen- 



23-i OPPOSITION TO SCIENCE. 

turies old ; that the occurrence of death is not a re- 
cent event, unnumbered individuals — nay, even un- 
numbered races of animated forms having passed 
away before the first man lived ; that climate modi- 
fies plants and animals, and even men ; that the plan- 
et we inhabit, if seen from the -sun, round which it re- 
volves, would seem like a little spark ; that if consid- 
ered with other orbs, its companions in the universe, 
it is as insignificant as a mote that dances in the sun- 
beam along with its companion motes ; that the mo- 
tions of the bodies of the solar system take place un- 
der a mathematical necessity, and that the world is 
governed by law ? 

What is there, I ask, in such things as these to pro- 
voke the resentment of man ? Why is it that he has 
visited with punishment those who first suggested 
many of them, and looks with jealous suspicion on 
those who receive them as true ? Why is it that in 
presence of the telegraph, the steamship, the locomo- 
tive, the printing-press, photography, and all the un- 
speakable triumphs of science in his behalf — triumphs 
the immediate results of the investigation and conclu- 
sions of science — why is it that he tries to stamp an 
odium on those who devote themselves to the true 
interpretation of Nature 2 

Is it any answer to say that, some fifteen hundred 
years ago, there was a Roman, general who seized im- 
perial power from his competitors, and whose polit- 



PROTECTION OF SCIENCE IN AMERICA. 235 

ical necessities were such that he had to inaugurate 
this untoward course ? Because he did it, therefore 
we must do it ! That is the only answer that can be 
made. 

How different would it have been with the Papacy, 
had it in its clay of power, instead of resisting the ad- 
vancement of human knowledge, fostered and favored 
it ! How different if, instead of perpetually looking 
backward, it had looked forward, and put itself forth 
as the promoter of intellectual development ! 

It falls to the lot of the American Republic to per- 
form the duty that was declined by Rome. Freedom 
for man, so far as his personal acts are concerned, is 
already secured; but how much still remains to be 
done for freedom of thought ! 

A country that owes its almost miraculous mate- 
rial prosperity to its frank acceptance of the idea that 
man can comprehend Nature and subjugate her to his 
use — a country that furnishes the most brilliant in- 
stance of the conquest of Nature by man, owes it to 
itself and owes it to the world to stand forth the De- 
fender and Protector of thought. 

Western Europe, to which in this particular we 
owe so much, labors under the dead weight of vast 
ecclesiastical establishments: their influences ramify 
through all the ranks of society. The tendency given 
to them by the Byzantine sovereigns and by the Ro- 
man Papacy is unchangeable. They will ever con- 



236 INTELLECTUAL FREEDOM. 

tinue to be what they have always been — the de- 
termined antagonists of science. 

In those countries every onward step that science 
makes implies a conflict. In America, where there is 
no such dead weight, and where the genius of the 
public institutions is so different, the progress of 
thought ought to be free. 

But is it so? Is there no insidious molestation? 
In a land that is netted with telegraph wires, and 
possessing, in a cheap post-office system, unparalleled 
means for the dissemination of thought, is it well that 
a new fact or a new doctrine should be received with 
a jealous eye, that looks more to an accordance with 
existing interests than to absolute truth ? 

Intellectual freedom must be secured as completely 
as the rights of property and personal liberty have 
been already secured. Philosophical opinions and 
scientific discoveries are entitled to be judged of by 
their truth, not by their relation to existing interests. 
The motion of the earth round the sun, the antiquity 
of the globe, the origin of species, are doctrines which 
have had to force their way, not against philosophical 
opposition, but opposition of a totally different na- 
ture. And yet the interests which resisted them so 
strenuously have received no damage from their es- 
tablishment beyond that consequent on the discredit 
of having so resisted them. 

There is no literary crime greater than that of ex- 



INTELLECTUAL FREEDOM. 237 

citing a social and especially a theological odium 
against ideas that are purely scientific, none against 
which the disapproval of every educated man ought 
to be more strongly expressed. The republic of let- 
ters owes it to its own dignity to tolerate no longer 
offenses of that kind. 



CHAPTER IV. 

ON THE NATURAL COURSE OF NATIONAL DEVELOPMENT. 

The Organization, Development, and Government of the Nat- 
ural World are shown to involve a continual tendency to con- 
centration of power, and the conferring of a dominant control 
on Intelligence. 

TJiis principle applies in the case of human societies during their 
political development. A comparison is instituted between the 
European method of government through the Morals, and the 
American of government through the Intellect. It is illus- 
trated by the history of England, taken as a type of the for- 
mer, and by the history of the United States, taken as a type 
of the latter. 

It follows, from the Intellectual method adopted, that America 
must be the scene of a future conflict of Ideas. TJieir ac- 
tion, reaction, and modificatio?is are alluded to, and the scien- 
tific tendency to unity of opinion p>ointed out. 

And, finally, the analogies between the Italian ecclesiastical sys- 
tem and the American civil system are referred to. 

The general object of the chapter is to shoio that in all durable 
human associations there is a natural, an inevitable tendency 
to the concentration of power ; and that, so far from this be- 
ing in antagonism to democratical institutions, it is their le- 
gitimate and unavoidable result. 

The Book of Nature, the Visible World, is always 
open to us for our instruction and guidance. From 
its pages we may gather lessons respecting the social 
progress of man. With silent enrphasis it appeals to 
our understanding, whatever may be the political 



THE COURSE OF NATURE. 239 

opinions we entertain, whatever the religions faith 
we prefer. 

It is no metaphor, but a reality, that the life of hu- 
man societies is typified by the life of plants and ani- 
mals. Throughout the whole world of organization 
the scheme of Nature is the same. 

I intend in this chapter, as clearly as I can, to pre- 
sent that scheme of progress ; to explain its intention, 
its aim — to show how human societies must comport 
themselves and follow the footprints of Nature. 

As we have seen, the progress of such societies is 
directed in part by physical influences, and in part by 
the force of Ideas, but it is always determined by law. 
American history furnishes signal examples of these 
truths. It shows us that climate has produced con- 
stitutional differences between the man of the North 
and the man of the South; that it has made them 
think differently and act differently; that it has 
brought into antagonism the enthusiastic impulsive- 
ness of the one and the inexorable perseverance of 
the other. 

Does not that history also illustrate the political 
force of an Idea ? 

And what is that Idea ? That there shall exist on 
this continent one Eepublic, great and indivisible, 
whose grandeur shall eclipse the grandeur of Rome 
in its brightest days — sovereign among the Powers 
of the earth ; so ruling in truth, in wisdom, in justice, 



240 DESTINY OF POLITICAL LIFE. 

in force, that every human being, no matter how ob- 
scure or desolate he may be, may find in it a refuge 
and protector ; that every government, from the At- 
lantic Ocean eastward to the Chinese Seas, no matter 
how strong it may be, shall listen with attention to 
its suggestions. 

To convert that vision of future greatness into a 
reality, organic laws that are at the basis of personal 
liberty have been, without a murmur or question, for 
a season surrendered ; a navy has been created, no in- 
adequate antagonist to the navies of the world ; an 
army has been organized equal to that of any of the 
greatest military monarchies of Europe. For four 
years in succession eight hundred millions of dollars 
have been spent. Rome never would have permitted 
a divided empire in Italy: the Lion will tolerate no 
competitor in his desert, the Eagle will endure no 
rival in the air. 

The first act in the drama of American national life 
is over. There are many good men who look linger- 
ingly on the past, expecting its wished -for return. 
The past never returns. With our high aspirations, 
our enormous military and industrial power, it is for 
us to turn our faces to the future. There is indeed a 
manifest destiny before us. 

There is a course through which we must go. Let 
us cast from ourselves the untrue, the unworthy be- 
lief that the will of man determines the events of this 



ARISTOTLE'S DISCOVERIES. 241 

world. National life is shaped by something far high- 
er than that ; it is shaped by a stern logic of events. 

In the Dark Ages they are said to have had magica] 
mirrors, on which, if a man looked, he might see re- 
flected all the future events of his life. Nature holds 
up her enchanted mirror to us : in the moving images 
and changing scenery it presents we may discern 
what we are about to be. 

When Alexander the Great, the ablest man of Eu- 
ropean antiquity, was engaged in the conquest of 
Asia, he gave to Aristotle, who had been his instruct- 
or, a million of dollars and the services of several 
thousand men, to enable him to write " A History of 
Animals." The organic world was ransacked, dissec- 
tions were made, habits were observed, descriptions 
written, drawings executed. The view of Aristotle, 
that all animals constitute a vast but a continuous 
chain — characterized by Humboldt, in our own times, 
as " very grand" — fell, however, out of sight after the 
death of Greece and the dissolution of the Roman 
Empire, the hybrid population subsequently inhabit- 
ing the shores of the Mediterranean being wholly un- 
able to rise to such magnificent conceptions. They 
were occupied with baser thoughts. 

Not until our own century have men been able to 
recover and appreciate that great idea. At length it 
has been thoroughly incorporated into modern physi- 

Q 



242 THE ORGANIC SERIES. 

ology. We shall see, to our surprise, that it is one 
of the keys of history. 

To the eye of the Physiologist all animated forms 
present themselves as one continuous chain — the Or- 
ganic Series he calls them. Commencing in lowly 
"beginnings, that are doubtfully separated from the 
vegetable world, they rise by continuous, by un- 
broken stages to the highest — that is, to man. It 
is the object of his study to ascertain the construc- 
tion, the anatomy of each of the essential links in that 
organic chain, and to observe the result, for the habits 
and instincts of these various beings are the conse- 
quences of their conformation. This work of prodig- 
ious labor accomplished, it is his hope to be able to 
attain to a comprehension of the whole scheme — to 
appreciate the creative thought that ]3ervades it — that 
has, in fact, called it into existence ; a study surpass- 
ing in its sublimity even the grandeur of astronomy, 
and, like it, teaching us to appreciate the thoughts 
and intentions of the Sovereign Constructor of the 
universe. 

Though very far from its completion, this study al- 
ready enables us to discern, it may be darkly, the 
grand plan. In this, the twilight of the breaking 
morning of human intelligence, we begin to perceive 
some of the bolder features of that landscape which 
hereafter, in the noontide of human reason, will be 
spread out, a vast panorama, before our descendants. 



GRADUAL CONTROL OF INTELLECT. 243 

Already we trace the course of Nature, we see the 
intention of this world of life. 

At the commencement of the vista of organization 
the forms are obscure, in structure simple, in habit 
low. Like the contrivances invented by man, they 
are mere automatons. As in a machine, if we touch 
a given spring a given motion will be produced, so 
these, acting unconsciously, move under the impulse 
inflicted. But, by a gradual unfolding of structure, 
part developing from part and function emerging from 
function, a higher stage is reached — to automatism 
instinct is added. The innumerable tribes exempli- 
fying this state excite our admiration by the orderly 
manner in w^hich they accomplish their predestined 
works, the bee building its comb, the spider construct- 
ing his web. But among these it is to be particular- 
ly observed that the qualities of the more lowly tribes 
are still present ; automatism has not been displaced 
by instinct, but instinct has been, as it were, super- 
posed, and both co-exist. Still looking along the 
chain as we advance, once more w r e recognize a rep- 
etition of the same process, or, more correctly, the 
gradual addition of something higher. Instinct is 
unfolding itself into Intelligence. The animated be- 
ing shows reasoning powers, at every successive rising 
link increasing in precision and perfection — the adap- 
tation of purposed means to the accomplishment of 
wished-for ends. The Dog forms his plans ; his mas- 



244 GRADUAL CONTROL OF INTELLECT. 

ter relates with admiration how lie has watched hirn 
proceed in carrying them out, persuading himself that 
there is something approaching to wisdom even in 
the brute. Here again, as in the former case, the new 
faculty has not destroyed the old one, "but intelligence 
is co-existing both with instinct and with automatism, 

This, then, is the sum of the matter. From a pure 
ly mechanical state, appropriately termed automatism 
a higher state, the Instinctive, is educed; from that 
in its turn, a still higher — the Intelligent. And, view 
ing the organic series from end to end, this is the af- 
firmation that may be made : the course of Nature is 
for the development and concentration of Intellect. 

I have abstained from burdening this description 
with anatomical discoveries and details; they are 
scarcely suitable for the present occasion. In that 
respect it is perhaps enough to say that the structure 
connected with these wonderful acts is the nervous 
system. In the lowliest tribes it is, as it were, rudi- 
mentary, its action purely mechanical. Next, offshoots 
of that rudiment appear, dedicated to special purposes 
— ganglia, as anatomists call them — intended to re- 
ceive the impressions of sound and of light. Step by 
step the development, the concentration proceeds, un- 
til a most important stage is eventually reached. In 
the region of the head a special mass, or rather pair 
of masses, appears, having direct connections of its 
own, by means of nerves, with all parts of the body. 



THE CONCENTRATION OF POWER. 245 

This organ, the cephalic ganglia, soon indicates what 
it is for — a control and government over all the rest. 
The impressions they receive are carried to it ; its vo- 
litions are sent back to them. 

Here we may pause a moment to make this signifi- 
cant remark — every thing is tending to a concentra- 
tion of power. 

In man each of these typical parts is present, and 
discharges the duties we have described. There is 
the spinal cord, acting automatically; there are the 
same special ganglia for breathing and swallowing; 
there are the same parts for hearing, sight, smell ; the 
same governing ganglia. He therefore combines the 
automatic and the instinctive apparatus. 

But it is to be especially observed that, as we ad- 
vance toward him through animals which, though in- 
ferior to him, are high in the scale of life, another 
most important part appears : we recognize it as the 
brain. The moment we discern that, reasoning pow r - 
ers are present, the degree of intelligence becoming 
more strikingly marked as the development of the 
new^ organ is greater. 

In the nervous system of man there are, therefore, 
three essentially distinct parts — the spinal cord, the 
ganglia of sense, the brain. Of the first, the action is 
purely automatic; by its aid we w r alk without be- 
stowing a thought on our movements from place to 
place ; we breathe without knowing it. The second 



246 THE CONCENTRATION OF POWER. 

is the place of reception of the impressions of external 
things — light, sound, odors; it is also the seat of 
consciousness; it is the instinctive mechanism. The 
third, the brain, is anatomically distinct. It is the 
theatre of ideas, the realm of thought, the instrument 
through which the mind works. 

There is, therefore, a regular progression, a definite 
improvement in this ascending gradation of animal 
life from the lowest to the superior; the plan never 
varying, but being persistently carried out. It begins 
with automatism, it advances to instinct, it reaches in- 
telligence. In fishes a true brain first appears ; it has 
received an improvement in reptiles ; it advances still 
farther in birds. In that same order the rate of in- 
telligence advances. Man presents the utmost perfec- 
tion thus far attained. His brain has reached a max- 
imum organization by a continued and unbroken pro- 
cess of development. 

If I have made myself understood in this orderly 
development of the ascending scale of animals, I shall 
not be misunderstood in obscurely referring to what, 
if the occasion permitted, I might dwell upon in de- 
tail. Identically the same orderly progress is recog- 
nized in the life of individual man. The primitive 
trace, as it faintly appears in the germinal membrane, 
marks out the automatic apparatus ; that is followed 
by the instinctive, for not until the twelfth week of 
life have we reached the condition permanently pre- 



INTELLECTUAL DEVELOPMENT OF THE WOULD. 247 

sented by birds ; a little later tlie brain is brought 
into a complete state ; and thus it appears that man 
proceeds through the same predetermined succession 
of forms. 

But that is not all. The biography of the earth, 
the life of the entire globe, corresponds to this prog- 
ress of the Individual, to this orderly advance of the 
animal series, as it is the glory of Geology to have 
shown. Commencing with the oldest rocks that fur- 
nish organic remains, and advancing to the most re- 
cent, we recognize the same continuous course of con- 
struction. 

What is the object, the end of all these successive 
phases of life ? Intellectual development. 

Ask the Anatomist ; he points you to the career of 
individual man, from the first dawn of life to its close, 
and tells you that every thing is aiming at Intellect. 

Ask the Physiologist; he bids you consider the 
vast series of animated forms inhabiting the earth 
with us. He affirms that we are reflected in them ; 
and that, as their advancement in the predetermined 
direction is greater, so is the order of their intelligence 
higher. 

Ask the Geologist, and he will declare that those 
conclusions hold good in the history of the earth, and 
that there has been an orderly improvement in intel- 
lectual power among the beings who have successive- 
ly inhabited it. 



248 ORGANIZATION OF NATIONAL INTELLECT. 

The sciences, therefore, affirm that the great aim of 
Nature is to reach controlling intellect. They pro- 
claim that the successive stages of every individual, 
from its earliest rudiment to maturity; the number- 
less organic beings now living with us and constitu- 
ting the animal series; the orderly appearance of that 
grand succession which, in the slow lapse of time, has 
emerged — all these three great lines of the manifest- 
ation of life furnish not only evidence, but also 
proof of the dominion of invariable law. The princi- 
ple is to advance from automatism to instinct, from 
instinct to intelligence. In man himself the three clis- 
tinct modes of life occur in an epochal order, through 
childhood to the most perfect state ; and this holding 
good for the individual, since it is physiologically im- 
possible to separate him from the race, what holds 
good for the one must hold good for the other too. 
Hence man is truly the archetype of society. His de- 
velopment is the model of what social progress must 
be. 

What, then, is the conclusion inculcated by these 
doctrines as regards the social progress of great com- 
munities ? It is, that all political institutions, imper- 
ceptibly or visibly, spontaneously or purposely, should 
tend to the improvement and organization of Nation- 
al Intellect. 

A nation may from this grand example trace out 
its proper course. The body politic, like the body 



UNIVERSAL EDUCATION. 249 

personal, must be ruled by its intellect. It is of no 
use to affirm that the foot, or the hand, or the stom- 
ach can guide as well as the head. The social ma- 
chine is composed of parts, each of which has its own 
appropriate duty to do. 

Already enlightened governments discern the truth 
of this. They rest their expectations, their hopes of 
society, on universal education, compulsory if need be, 
to give to each one the opportunity of improvement 
up to the point that Nature has permitted for him. 

But education is a term of wide import. That de- 
manded by modern times must represent the contem- 
poraneous knowledge of the race. The defect of our 
present systems is this: — that they look too much to 
the past ; they deal too much with the doubtful, too 
little with the exact. 

A dozen rich gentlemen may meet together and 
proceed to build a railroad across the continent, or 
lay a telegraphic wire under the Atlantic Ocean. 
They may do whatever is possible to the omnipo- 
tence of wealth. But, though all Americans should 
constitute themselves a joint -stock company, they 
never, by any votes or any resolves, could call into 
existence a great soldier, a great lawgiver, a great 
philosopher. They could never create a Newton, a 
Milton, an Alexander. Talent is a God-given gift. 

Then, though public education is an eminent ad- 
vantage, it is far from being every thing. The ad- 



250 THE FOSTERING OF NATIVE TALENT. 

vancernent of a nation to greatness demands that not 
only shall every individual be instructed, tut that the 
career shall be ojoen to talent. That principle was 
thoroughly understood by the great Italian statesmen 
who for so many centuries controlled European af- 
fairs. They found out and fostered intellect wherever 
they could. How often did they take the cowl from 
the monk, and give him in exchange a mitre ! It sig- 
nified nothing to them that the greatest churchman 
might have come from the lowest dregs of society. 
Wealth, and splendors, and worldly dignity they 
could amply bestow; Intellect they were obliged to 
find. 

For stability to be attained, a nation must submit 
to be controlled by its reason ; it must organize its 
intellect, it must concentrate it. 

There are but three powers that can organize the 
world — theology, literature, science. EurojDe has tried 
the first ; her present condition shows what is the ut- 
most it can do. China has tried the second, and has 
become conceited and exclusive. It has been truly 
affirmed that for these purposes science has this ad- 
vantage over literature, that it admits of universal 
communion. 

Let us not, however, fall into the delusion of ex- 
pecting what will never happen from such social or- 
ganization ; the very term itself implies, on the one 
hand, superiority; on the other, subordination. Do 



SOCIAL SUBORDINATION. 251 

what we may, no organization, no education will ever 
make all men alike. By far the most numerous por- 
tion of our race must devote itself to labor, scarcely 
ever learning any thing except what concerns its daily 
toil : whatever improvement it attains to is by mere 
imitation. It follows its hereditary instincts, having 
no idea of progress, none of development. Governed 
by external influences and by its own appetites, it can 
neither combine nor generalize. Its movements alto- 
gether depend on the unrecognized influence of exter- 
nal agents. That vast mass, like a cloud, drifts along 
to its destiny in an invisible wind. 

In our nation there has been a period of material 
prosperity, of which I think Ave shall all agree in say- 
ing that it has had no parallel in the world. Wealth, 
honorably acquired, has poured in upon us until we 
have become blinded to all things else. Here and 
there a thoughtful man may be found who has seen 
with misgivings that it is not spiritual, but physical 
aspirations that have heretofore predominated among 
us. How true it is that, for a nation to be great, it 
must aim at something above its animal nature ! 

We are in the act of transition from the animal to 
the intellectual. War, civil war, with its dread pun- 
ishments, is not without its uses. In no other school 
than that of war can society learn subordination, in 
no other can it be made to appreciate order. It may 
be true, as has been affirmed, that men secretly love 



952 GROWTH AND DIFFERENTIATION. 

to obey those whom they feel to be their superiors 
intellectually. In military life they learn to practice 
that obedience openly. 

I turn from the hideous contemplation of a disor- 
ganization of the Republic, each state, and county, and 
towm setting up for itself, and the continent swarming 
with the maggots bred from the dead body politic. I 
turn from that to a future I see in prospect — an impe- 
rial race organizing its intellect, concentrating it, and 
voluntarily submitting to be controlled by its reason ; 
a race despising that low grade of life into which its 
enemies have tauntingly said that it has descended, 
and that, like certain base animals, it may be sponta- 
neously dissevered into a multitude of parts, each be- 
ing as good as any of the rest, and capable of the same 
obscene separations again. 

In thus asserting that in all human communities, as 
their life advances, there must be a continual tenden- 
cy to a concentration of power and a develojmient of 
intellect, I am presenting the conclusions of observers 
of Nature. 

Physiologists say that growth is an increase in the 
size of a structure of any kind, no variation occurring 
in the character of the fabric or in the functions it 
discharges ; but differentiation is an increase involv- 
ing modification of fabric and assumption of new 
functions. 

The lowest j)lants simply grow; they increase by 



DIFFERENTIATION. 253 

the addition of units or parts of the same kind and 
having the same office. They have no mutual de- 
pendence except that consequent on their mere me- 
chanical union. They may be cut to pieces, and, as 
we. have just observed, each portion is as perfect, as 
good as the rest. Each individually, and all conjoint- 
ly, are very low. 

But in the highest plants there is something more. 
At one point roots are put forth, at another leaves, at 
another flowers. The duty of the root is to hold the 
plant in the ground, and furnish it with water and 
some salts ; that of the leaves, to procure nutriment 
from the air ; that of the flowers, to reproduce plants 
of the same kind. These various, these different or- 
gans have been evolved or differentiated for those 
purposes. 

The same remark applies to animals. In the low- 
est, breathing, digestion, and all the various other 
functions needful for life are confusedly blended to- 
gether, and obscurely discharged by the selfsame 
part. In the highest, special organs, the lungs, the 
stomach, etc., have been differentiated from the grow- 

7 7 O 

ing mass for these special functions. 

Now we must particularly remark the manner in 
which all this is done. If, for a new purpose, a new 
organ is wanted, Nature never fashions it in secret or 
apart, finishing her work by attaching the new pro- 
duct to the structure intended to be improved. Men, 



254 POLITICAL DIFFERENTIATION. 

when they design to improve a house, bring the nec- 
essary materials from elsewhere, and make their ad- 
dition by attaching it. Not so with Nature. She 
evolves from what is already pre-existing — there 
comes an outshoot, not an addition. Thus, in the il- 
lustration we have referred to, she makes flowers from 
parts that, had the differentiation been otherwise, 
might have been leaves. 

It is, as I have said, no metaphor, but a reality, that 
human societies are typified by plants and animals. 
Both, in their lowest grades, are aggregates increasing 
by the addition of parts, each of which is similar, and 
acts similarly to all its fellows. In a tribe of savages 
each man does every thing for himself. By degrees 
special pursuits pass into the hands of particular in- 
dividuals. The process goes on until three distinct 
social divisions are established — a laboring class, a 
trading or transferring class, an intellectual class. 
Political differentiation has taken place. 

Society thus passes through a definite, an orderly 
succession of changes. It grows at first by the addi- 
tion of units ; then, under internal and external influ- 
ences, it begins "to differentiate. 

In individual man how strikingly, also, is the same 
thing perceived ! It is not a mere growth or devel- 
opment alone that occurs ; but when that process has 
gone on to a certain extent, a new condition of things 
abruptly takes place, a difference in structure, a clif- 



DIFFERENTIATION AND DEVELOPMENT. 255 

ference in function suddenly arising — suddenly, yet, 
as we find when we examine the matter critically, in 
a necessary and inevitable way ; for the new things 
have issued forth from the old by an insensible shad- 
ing, so that we can not tell at what time the one end- 
ed or when the other began. In spite of the rapidity 
with which the change may have taken place, we still 
discern consecutive points bearing a determinate rela- 
tion to one another. Development thus gives rise to 
differentiation : they do not stand in an attitude of 
antagonism. 

It is immaterial whether we consider the entire hu- 
man body in the aggregate, or limit ourselves to the 
investigation of its constituent parts; whether we 
describe man existing as a water-breathing, and then 
abruptly at his first respiration as an air-breathing 
animal; or whether, descending to minor details, we 
investigate the structure of his digestive, circulating, 
absorbing, or other parts, and the duties they dis- 
charge. As his development goes on, differentiation 
in a necessary manner, at determinate epochs, takes 
place ; and thus he proceeds through a multitude of 
forms in an orderly succession, each form issuing from 
the preceding one in an unavoidable way. Nor is 
there any possibility that a single step in the whole 
progress can be omitted. What better proof can we 
have of the determinate character of this advance 
than the fact that it is repeated, with all its peculiar- 



256 LAW OF VON BAR. 

ities of epochs and phases, by every individual ? The 
complete and affiliated series of embryonic forms pre- 
sented in the early period of the life of man is only 
an exemplification that he is held fast in the grasp of 
those laws which control all other animals. 

So, in communities, development takes place from 
point to point; it issues in their numerical increase, 
their geographical spread, their growth. For a while, 
from year to year, it may offer no point of perceptible 
change, but at last differentiation occurs — not so ab- 
ruptly as in the instance of the individual, for the 
general scale of time has been enlarged. It makes it- 
self manifest by a cessation of the old and an exhibi- 
tion of the new — by an abandonment of former habits 
of action, by an appearance of new modes of thought. 
The society that has passed through such an epoch 
looks back on its history with surprise, half wonder- 
ing whether it can be really true that it once concern- 
ed itself in actions now appearing so unsuitable and 
unworthy — that it once was sincerely engaged with 
mental conceptions now seeming to be so clearly fal- 
lacious. 

The law of development, known among physiolo- 
gists as that of Von Bar, and of the truth of which 
there is now abundant proof, is to the effect that "the 
heterogeneous arises from the homogeneous by a grad- 
ual process of change." Thus, from the starting-point 
of all living forms — a simple cell — there are unfolded 



DIFFERENTIATION OF COMMUNITIES. 257 

in a proper order successive parts devoted to special 
duties, and from these, in their turn, in like manner 
secondary and tertiary subdivisions arise, the duty 
discharged in the first instance by the aggregate be- 
ing now accomplished by the special portions, and 
therefore in a more complete and perfect way. 

What thus takes place in the individual also takes 
place in the nation. We deceive ourselves when we 
suppose that the process of human affairs is ever dis- 
turbed by the intrusion of things that are intrinsical- 
ly new. Every event, no matter how abruptly it may 
occur, is, if we carefully consider it, indissolubly affili- 
ated with events that have gone before, and draws in 
its train others that of necessity follow. In this, as in 
the former instance, we never encounter the appear- 
ance of incongruous things, but all proceeds in an or- 
derly way. Our daily experience assures us that for 
the success of any human undertaking opportunity is 
essential. Without that the greatest genius and the 
greatest exertions are spent in vain. The physiolog- 
ical law of Von Bar holds as good in race advance- 
ment as it does in individual. Its action is expressed 
in both instances in a similar manner. 

It is through the general operation of this law that 
communities emerge from the lowest grades of social 
life — from that barbarous condition in which all indi- 
viduals are occupied in all pursuits, and especially ex- 
celling in none ; in which the avocations of the farm- 

K 



258 THE INDIVIDUAL AND SOCIETY. 

er, the huntsman, the mechanic, are all equally dis- 
charged by each individual. It is through the opera- 
tion of this law that, as society is advancing in its 
course from that confused condition in which all 
things were Wended together, that special duties and 
special avocations begin to emerge; through it the 
process of partition and separation, as expressed in 
the different trades and occupations, is continued; 
through it the skilled labor of civilized communities 
results. In thus applying a physiological law hold- 
ing good for the individual to this our social state, 
we indulge in no fictitious hypothesis. Society is 
only an aggregate of individuals ; whatever affects, 
whatever regulates each of them, must affect and reg- 
ulate it also. Its actions are the sum of their actions. 
By the light thrown from the history of the indi- 
vidual on that of society, we ascertain the true inter- 
pretation of the successive stages in the course of the 
latter, and determine the value of each of its constit- 
uent parts ; that, equally in the one as in the other, 
the first moments are devoted to the necessities of an- 
imal existence, and only by degrees does the intellect- 
ual begin to emerge. The first phases of life, no mat- 
ter what may be the scale on which we consider it, 
individual or social, are essentially vegetative, the op- 
eration being, as the advance goes on, to disentangle 
the intellectual from the clogs that are attached to it, 
and at last to accomplish its isolation. As by such 



PERSONS AND PARTICLES. 259 

partitions and separations it increases in purity, it 
also increases in power, until, in the end, it becomes 
the authoritative, the governing, and regulating prin- 
ciple, subjecting all other things to its dominion. 

We may therefore transfer from the individual to 
society all those phenomena of equilibrium and move- 
ment observed by Physiologists. In the same man- 
ner that we see in the individual organic particles in 
all stages of activity and decline, some subserving 
one, some another duty, so in society we distinguish 
between the uses and conditions of different persons. 
It is to be remembered that Persons are the equiva- 
lent of Particles. Notwithstanding this diversity of 
their functions, all, without any exception, are under 
the necessity of submitting to the same laws, and 
therefore run through similar cycles of motion, having 
a period at which they make their appearance as or- 
ganic elements, a period at which they enter upon 
their destined duty, a period of maximum develop- 
ment and force, one also of decline. And as in the 
individual we find particles of different constitutions 
arranged in different places for the proper perform- 
ance of their functions, so the social grades and sev- 
eral occupations of men answer thereto. Seen in this 
light, it is plain that all have a duty to discharge — a 
duty not alone to themselves, but to the aggregate of 
which they form a part, and to the well-being of 
which they are essential. All, therefore, in one sense, 



260 PERFORMANCE OF SPECIAL DUTIES. 

are equal, for each lias an indispensable duty allotted, 
each being equally useful, equally worthy. The in- 
tellectual relations of society can not be maintained 
save by the aid of its organic relations, any more than 
the intellectual functions of the individual can be suc- 
cessfully accomplished except by the co-operation of 
the functions of organic life. How is it possible that 
the brain, in one sense the most noble portion of the 
human economy, should discharge its duty aright, or 
even discharge it at all, unless the subordinate organs 
of circulation, respiration, digestion, carry forward at 
a determinate rate their more humble yet necessary 
duties ? 

Such considerations teach us how visionary are the 
expectations of those who hope to produce, either by 
legal enactments or the artificial operation of educa- 
tion, an equality among the constituent parts of the 
social organism. In the body of man all is not for 
intellection, all is not for nutrition or assimilation — 
there is a diversity of duties, which, for perfection, 
must be harmoniously blended. And so in society, 
which is a vast individual — a great living, feeling, 
thinking mass — if its development is to go on to the 
utmost perfection, there must be a similar subordina- 
tion of office implying a subordination of parts. 
Some, and by far the larger portion, must devote 
themselves to duties of a wholly material nature ; in 
this representing those particles which, in the Individ- 



PUBLIC AND PRIVATE RELATIONS. 261 

ual, discharge trie humbler offices of organic life, and 
provide for the nutrition and development of the 
body; some, on the other hand, and these relatively 
but few in number, are more immediately connected 
with the higher functions — the operations of intellect. 
Of these it is the especial, the unavoidable duty to 
exercise a direct influence over all. In China, where 
this principle is recognized in practical politics, they 
deride Occidental democracy, and consider us as hard- 
ly emerged from a barbarous state, who commit gov- 
erning power to those who are altogether animalized, 
and can neither read nor write, instead of making in- 
tellectual power a measure of political control, as is 
the case in their system of statesmanship, which, on 
a comparatively small geographical surface, governs 
dense masses of men. 

A closer examination of the relations of the constit- 
uent particles of the body indicates to us that they 
are capable of a twofold division, each having connec- 
tions of an interior kind, which, as it were, concern it- 
self alone, and also others of an exterior kind, which 
it maintains with the whole organism. In a meta- 
phorical manner we may thus say that it has private 
and public engagements ; and, considering the matter 
critically, we can not fail to detect that the former are 
essentially of a lower kind : they are indeed subordi- 
nate to the latter, for the sake of which they in reali- 
ty exist. Transferring our thoughts in this particular 



262 PUBLIC AND PRIVATE RELATIONS. 

from trie individual tody to the body politic, we see 
how great a mistake we commonly make in our ap- 
preciation of such relations. In the individual how 
plausibly we magnify the importance of private life, 
and diminish the value of the public connection ! Yet 
it is for the latter, not for the former, that a person is 
brought into existence. He will have done well if, 
in those general relations, he has rightly discharged 
his duty; nor can any excellence in the private con- 
duct compensate for any deficiency in the public. 
Too often we invert the sentiment on the value of 
which I am here insisting, and gratify a vain selfish- 
ness by concluding that we have been brought into 
the world each for the sake of himself; that our con- 
tinuance here is for our own individual benefit ; and 
all our hopes and aspirations for the future are re- 
stricted to ourselves, others participating therein only 
in an incidental and indirect way. From this narrow 
view we may be justly startled by a right sense of 
our obligations to the body of which we constitute a 
part, and, by a philosophical examination of our true 
position, learn how great a deception we are practicing 
upon ourselves; that we have not been introduced 
here and do not continue here for our own j^ersonal 
sake, but that we may share in the development and 
accomplishment of a result of a far higher order. In 
this the part we have to play may be, in one sense, 
insignificant and transient, but, in a truer sense, it is 
important and enduring. 



THE REPUBLIC. 263 

We may now apply the general principles indicated 
on the preceding pages to the special case of America. 

One of the greatest of the Greek philosophers, 
Plato, held that in a political sense men are to be 
considered, not as men, but as elements of the state ; 
thus carrying to its extreme consequence the idea of 
that public relation just referred to. In America, the 
principle of individual independence being thorough- 
ly admitted, that independence can only be secured 
by political organization ; and hence, the Platonic idea 
being accepted, individuals must be considered as ex- 
isting for the state. To it they owe whatever they 
have, even life. 

The fabric of the Republic arose from the sponta- 
neous coalescence of such elements. The first immi- 
grants necessarily maintained purely democratic rela- 
tions, with only such subordination as their existing 
needs required. When, in the course of time, colony 
began to establish connections with colony, the prin- 
ciple of equality was never for a moment forgotten. 
From the union of individuals towns arose ; from the 
union of towns, states ; from the union of states, the 
Republic. This coalescence of individuals was and is 
still greatly facilitated by a certain sameness of hab- 
its among all classes, arising from their issuing from 
a common origin. Temporary differences of wealth 
are of little moment : the poor of to-day may be the 
rich of to-morrow. 



2(54: THE REPUBLIC. 

The modes of life of various classes being more 
similar than in Europe, individuals fall more readily 
into place, and more easily assume a fitting associa- 
tion with one another. From this arises that senti- 
ment of equality which curbs and checks the senti- 
ment of individual independence. 

The Republic may therefore be regarded as a re- 
strained association of free individuals, voluntarily 
surrendering a part of their personal independence 
for the common good, yet all the time conscious and 
jealous of that surrender. They have bartered a por- 
tion of their liberty for security. Labor is its essen- 
tial basis. In America, every one, even though he 
may be rich, must have some ostensible occupation. 
A healthy public sentiment makes it disreputable to 
be idle. 

Liberty, therefore, is always, if such a paradox may 
be excused, liberty under restraint. It appertains not 
to the position an individual occupies, it is inherent 
in humanity. 

Elsewhere nations are governed too much ; here no 
restraint is admissible beyond that necessary for the 
well-being and life of the body politic. But in that 
maxim much is embraced. Coercion, more energetic 
and more formidable than that ever felt in the most 
absolute monarchies, becomes justifiable, if necessary 
to preserve the national life. The individual must not 
for an instant stand in the way of the public good. 



CONSTRUCTIVE DEMOCRACY. 265 

There are singular advantages arising from a per- 
sonal acknowledgment of this force of public author- 
ity, and of the inevitable direction its action will take. 
In foreign countries there is no definitely visible path 
in which it is clear that the nation will advance ; here 
every one sees plainly what the course of progress 
must inevitably be. The popular phrase, " manifest 
destiny," marks out this recognition. There hence 
arises a concert of action, which adds prodigiously to 
the public power. The momentum of the whole pop- 
ulation is felt in a definite direction. 

Placed in such circumstances, a democracy will ex- 
hibit an instinct of cohesion in all its parts. Herein 
is the explanation of the remark so often made by 
observing statesmen respecting the essential difference 
between democracies in Europe and America — that 
the former are destructive, the latter constructive. 

This constructiveness is strikingly seen in new-set- 
tled American states. Where, but a short time be- 
fore, there was an untrodden wilderness, population be- 
gan to converge — a village formed. In an incredibly 
short time, organization of the infant community might 
be observed ; its outward signs, the school-house, the 
town-hall, the church, the newspaper. These differ- 
entiations from the growing body spontaneously is- 
sued from the people ; they required no stimulus from 
above. The village rapidly grew into a town. All 
round it, in precisely like manner, other towns w^ere 



& 



266 SENSITIVENESS OF A DEMOCRACY. 

emerging. The instinct of cohesion I have referred to 
combined them together; an organized territory, a 
state, is the result. Constructive affinity still contin- 
ues to be manifested, and the new state merges into 
and becomes an acknowledged part of the Republic. 
It loses forever, if indeed it ever possessed, the attri- 
bute of independent sovereignty. 

Throughout this process of events self-government 
is perpetually manifest. Each individual bears a con- 
scious share in each of the stages of procedure and in 
the final result. Hence arises a property of such a 
democracy unfortunately not understood in Europe, 
In monarchical countries war and peace are easily 
made. The people are rarely penetrated by a just 
appreciation of the points in dispute. The conflicting 
authorities, sovereigns or royal houses, compose their 
quarrel ; the community acquiesces. 

Not so in a self-conscious democracy. A public 
injury, perpetrated by a foreign power, is at once 
accepted by each individual as his personal affair. 
When the English government conceded belligerent 
rights to the insurgent states, there was not an Amer- 
ican who did not personally appropriate the offense. 
Such a sensitiveness is often imputed, by those who 
have not considered the peculiarities of democratic 
life, to the youth of the nation or to other transitory 
causes. It arises, however, from a very different, and, 
it may be added, a far more dangerous condition. A 



CENTRALIZATION AND SELF-GOVERNMENT. 267 

course that might be pursued with impunity by one 
royal house toward another, can not wisely be pur- 
sued toward a self-conscious democracy ; for it has a 
retentive memory, and is, in virtue of its very consti- 
tution, unforgiving. 

The instinct of self-government, so characteristic of 
the American democracy, thus leads to the formation 
of villages, towns, counties, territories, states — nay, 
even to the expansion of the Kepublic itself. So far 
from centralization and self-government standing in 
opposition to each other, as some authors have sup- 
posed, the former necessarily issues out of the latter. 
Self-government, instead of conveying the idea of ab- 
solute freedom, conveys, in reality, the idea of re- 
straint — restraint spontaneously imposed. If, as must 
be the case in self-conscious communities, that re- 
straint is organized by those who are intending to 
submit to its rule, centralization is the necessary re- 
sult. 

Moreover, the instinct of self-government implies 
an instinct for enlightenment — an insatiable thirst 
for information. This is recognized in all directions 
in America. It satisfies itself by the creation of 
great educational establishments, and descends even 
to amusing details. The Yankee converses in ques- 
tions. 

Every one is penetrated with the conviction that 
for social advancement to pursue the right direction, 



268 EUROPEAN GOVERNMENT THROUGH MORALS. 

and to be pressed forward at the highest speed, it 
must be controlled by intelligence. Hence the pub- 
lic prosperity is considered to depend on education. 
There can be no doubt that this is a very high and 
noble conception. It establishes an intrinsic differ- 
ence between the people of Europe and the people of 
America. 

In Europe the attempt has been made to govern 
communities through their morals alone. The pres- 
ent state of that continent, at the close of so many 
centuries, shows how great the failure has been. In 
America, on the contrary, the attempt is to govern 
through intelligence. It will succeed. 

From the American principle, it follows that who- 
ever seeks the improvement of his fellow-men, the en- 
nobling of the community among whom he lives, or 
the true glory of the nation, can best accomplish his 
purpose by spreading forth the light of knowledge, 
and strengthening and developing the public under- 
standing. 

For more than a thousand years the moral system 
has been tried in Europe. Its agent, the ecclesiastic, 
was animated by intentions that were good, by per- 
severance unwearied, by a vigorous energy. The fail- 
ure is attributable, not to shortcomings in him, but to 
intrinsic defects in his method; though on that con- 
tinent, in a very imperfect manner, in later times the 
other method has spontaneously and with much re- 



AMERICAN GOVERNMENT THROUGH INTELLECT. 269 

sistance made itself felt ; a wonderful result is begin- 
ning to be apparent. The apprehension entertained 
by many good men in former times, that if the mind 
be instructed the morals may be injured, has proved 
to be unfounded. Men are better in proportion as 
they are wiser. In whatever direction we look, we 
see the improvement. The physical man is more 
powerful, the intellectual man more perfect, the moral 
man more pure. For the poor, in the midst of all this 
social activity, this business energy, charity is none 
the less overflowing ; for him who wishes to improve 
his life there is certain to be encouragement. 

Whoever in America desires to better his fellow- 
men must act by influencing their intellect. If he 
wishes to see no idle man and no poor man in the 
land, he must take care that there shall be no igno- 
rant man. Ignorance is not, as in the old times they 
used to say, the mother of devotion ; she is the moth- 
er of superstition and misery. 

If we wish to know how we may best clear from 
this continent the superabundant forests that encum- 
ber it — how we may best lay the iron rail and put 
the locomotive upon it — how we may most prof- 
itably dig the abounding metals from their veins — 
how we may instantaneously communicate with our 
most distant towns — how we may cover the ocean 
with our ships — how we may produce a sober, indus- 
trious, healthy, moral population, we shall find our 



270 SOCIAL POSITION OF WOMEN. 

answer in providing universal instruction. That spon- 
taneously provides occupation. The morality of a na- 
tion is the aggregate of the morality of individuals. 
A lazy man is necessarily a bad man ; an idle is nec- 
essarily a demoralized population. 

In such provisions for the rising generations there 
is a special interest which ought never to be over- 
looked. On many occasions social requirements press 
with melancholy severity on the female sex. Wom- 
en can not engage in the rough conflicts of life. Few 
are the occupations to which they can with propriety 
turn, and even in those few, to the disgrace of men 
be it said, they are jostled, and crushed, and crowded 
out. Yet often the friendless woman has duties to 
perform for herself and those dependent on her of the 
highest kind. Society inexorably binds her with all 
its rules and usages, yet society too often yields her 
but a feeble help. No more is wanted than freedom 
for her hands, no more than opportunity, yet how oft- 
en is that freedom, that opportunity denied ! How 
many of the fearful evils of great cities may be direct- 
ly traced to the compulsory, the profitless inaction of 
young women ! 

I repeat again the great truth, that the only meth- 
od of ameliorating the condition of men is by acting 
on their intelligence; even their morals must be 
guided by their understanding. This principle has 
been carried into practical effect by a race whom we 



CHINESE MODE OF GOVERNMENT. 271 

affect to despise. Ages ago, in China, they had pass- 
ed through the various experiments which the West- 
ern nations are now so sedulously trying ; and ages 
ago they came to the conclusion that government, to 
be effectual, satisfactory, permanent, must operate 
through the public intelligence. In that they follow 
nature. In our supercilious conceit we laugh at the 
Chinese ; his bodily formation and grotesque manners 
are topics of merriment to us. We say he opens his 
eyes vertically, like a pair of folding doors, our own 
opening horizontally, as properly fixed windows ought 
to do. We exult in the glory of a luxuriant beard 
spread broadly over the breast, and ridicule him who, 
having none, ties up his long hair into a tail, and lets 
it hang down his back. But the wisdom of a man 
does not depend on these decorations being either in 
front or behind. If we, knowing very imperfectly the 
ideas of the old man of the Mongols, irreverently set 
him down as a superannuated dotard, he, in an equal- 
ly imperfect way, learning of our proceedings in state- 
craft and our anarchy of creeds, regards us as " out- 
side barbarians," and, judging from the rude violence 
with which we seek to make him recognize our ac- 
quaintance, as " red-headed devils." 

But this supremely solemn old man has clone some- 
thing that we can not help seeing, no matter in what 
way we open our eyes. He has found out the means 
by which more than three hundred millions of men 



272 CHINESE MODE OF GOVERNMENT. 

— more than ten times the population of the United 
States — more than one third of the human race, have 
been for ages kej)t in happiness, prosperity, and peace. 
Long ago he had accomplished the thing which we, 
on a smaller scale, are attempting. If we could sur- 
prise him into a moment's relaxation from the amen- 
ities of exquisite courteousness and from the artifices 
of infinite dissimulation — if we could coax from him 
his secret, this is what he would say : " Educate ev- 
ery body. In every child that is born, the state, 
as well as the parent, has a right. I compel all to 
go to school. I push forward the brightest of the 
children into academies, and from thence the boys 
who are distinguished above their fellow-boys by su- 
perior endowments I send to the college. From the 
new conflict of mind that there ensues I select the vic- 
tors, and, transplanting them to active life, intrust to 
them the superintendence of districts. Those who 
have displayed capacity on that scale I promote to 
the government of provinces. They who approve 
themselves in the ordeal of that greater trial are re- 
lied upon as the counselors and guides of the Impe- 
rial authority at last. In China our ancestors organ- 
ized the National Intellect ; we honor learning above 
all other things. The road to greatness is open to 
him who has capacity to walk in it. Our educated 
are not our dangerous classes, but firm supporters of 
the state ; and the result is, that we are the most mi- 






THE SCHOOL, THE PULPIT, THE PRESS. 273 

inerous, in our internal affairs the most prosperous 
and the most contented nation of the earth." 

That is the manner in which the Asiatics have re- 
solved the great problem of statesmanship. The de- 
tails might not answer to our Western life, but their 
example and its success may well afford us a topic of 
profound meditation. 

It is not necessary here to discuss formally the 
question whether social advancement is best secured 
through moral or intellectual action. In America the 
latter method has been adopted ; and accepting that 
in contradistinction to the former, which is followed 
in Europe, I may briefly allude to certain points con- 
nected with the practical manner in which it is car- 
ried into effect. 

There are three organs of public instruction — the 
school, 4he pulpit, the press. 

As respects schools, the primary condition for their 
efficiency is a supply of well -trained and competent 
teachers. In former times the education of youth was 
too often surrendered to persons who had become su- 
perannuated in other pursuits, or had failed in them, 
or had been left in destitute circumstances. But lit- 
tle heed was given by parents or the public to the 
quality of the information imparted in these concerns. 
There was a vague notion, which, as we shall see, still 
unhappily prevails as regards the higher establish- 
ments of education, that the training of the mind is 

S 



274 PRINCIPLE OF EDUCATION. 

of more importance than the nature of the information 
imparted to it. 

Normal schools for the preparation of teachers must 
necessarily be an essential part of any well-ordered 
public school system. In these, young persons of 
both sexes may be prepared for assuming the duties 
of teaching. The rule under which they should not 
only be taught, but likewise subsequently teach — the 
rule that should be made to apply in every establish- 
ment, from the primary school to the university, is 
this — Education should represent the existing state 
of knowledge. 

But in America this golden rule is disregarded, es- 
pecially in the case of the higher establishments. 
What is termed classical learning arrogates to itself 
a space that excludes much more important things. 
It finds means to appropriate, practically, all collegiate 
honors. This evil has arisen from the circumstance 
that our system was imported from England. It is a 
remnant of the tone of thought of that country in the 
sixteenth century; meritorious enough and justifiable 
enough in that day, but obsolete in this. The vague 
impression to which I have above referred, that such 
pursuits impart a training to the mind, has long sus- 
tained this inappropriate course. It also finds an ex- 
cuse in its alleged power of communicating the wis- 
dom of past ages. The grand depositories of human 
knowledge are not the ancient, but the modern 



CLASSICAL INSTRUCTION. 275 

tongues. Few, if any, are the facts worth knowing 
that are to be exclusively obtained by a knowledge 
of Latin and Greek ; and as to mental discipline, it 
might reasonably be inquired how much a youth will 
secure by translating daily a few good sentences of 
Latin and Greek into bad and broken English. So 
far as a preparation is required for the subsequent 
struggles and conflicts of life — for discerning the in- 
tentions and meeting the rivalries of competitors — for 
skill to design movements and carry them out with 
success — for cultivating a clearness of perception into 
the character and motives of others, and for impart- 
ing a decision to our own actions — so far as these 
things are concerned, an ingenious man would have 
no difficulty in maintaining the amusing affirmation 
that more might be gained from a mastery of the 
game of chess than by translating all the Greek and 
Latin authors in the world. 

The remarks I am thus making respecting the im- 
perfections of general education apply, I think, very 
forcibly to the education of the clergy. The school, 
the pulpit, the press, being the three organs of public 
instruction, a right preparation of the clergy for their 
duty is of as much moment as a right preparation 
of teachers and journalists. 

In the education of the American clergyman the 
classical element very largely predominates. Indeed, 
it may with truth be affirmed that it is to no incon- 



276 EDUCATION OF THE CLERGY. 

siderable degree for the sake of securing such a result 
that that element is so carefully fostered in the col- 
leges, from which it would otherwise have long ago 
been eliminated, or, at all events, greatly reduced in 
prominence. The strength of this wish is manifested 
by the munificent endowments with which many 
pious and patriotic men have sustained classical 
professorships. Perhaps, however, they do not suffi- 
ciently reflect that the position and requirements of 
the clergy have of late years very much changed. 
Preaching must answer to the mode of thinking of 
the congregations. But now literary authority has 
to a very great degree lost its force. Elucidations of 
Scripture and the defense of doctrine, in modern times, 
require modern modes of treatment. 

But, moreover, in one important respect is the edu- 
cation of the clergy defective. Unhappily, and, it may 
be added, unnecessarily, there has arisen, as was re- 
lated in the last chapter, an apparent antagonism be- 
tween Theology and Science. Tradition has been 
made to confront Discovery. Now, the discussion 
and correct appreciation of any new scientific fact re- 
quires a special training, a special stock of knowl- 
edge. That training, that knowledge, are not to be 
had in theological seminaries. The clergyman is thus 
constrained to view with jealous distrust the rapid 
advancement of practical knowledge. In the case of 
any new fact, his inquiry necessarily is, not whether it 



EDUCATION OF THE CLERGY. 277 

is absolutely true, but whether it is in accordance with 
conceptions he considers established. The result of 
this condition of things is, that many of the most im- 
portant, the most powerful and exact branches of hu- 
man knowledge, have been forced into a position they 
never would have voluntarily assumed, and have been 
compelled to put themselves on their defense — As- 
tronomy, in the case of the globular form of the 
earth, and its position as a subordinate planet ; Geol- 
ogy, as respects its vast antiquity ; Zoology, on the 
problem of the origin of species ; Chemistry, on the 
unchangeability of matter and the indestructibility of 
force. 

In thus criticising education in the higher Ameri- 
can establishments, I present views that have forced 
themselves on my attention in an experience of thirty 
years, and on a very extensive scale. Not unfrequent- 
ly I have superintended the instruction, professional 
or otherwise, of nearly four hundred young men in 
the course of a single year, and have had unusual op- 
portunities of observing their subsequent course of 
life. 

The education of the clergy, I think, is not equal 
to that of physicians or lawyers. The provisions are 
sufficient, and the time is sufficient, but the direction 
is faulty. In the study of medicine every thing is 
done to impart to the pupil a knowledge of the pres- 
ent state of the subjects or sciences with which he is 



278 EDUCATION OF THE CLERGY. 

concerned. The profession watches with a jealous 
eye its colleges, exposing without hesitation any 
shortcomings it detects. It will not be satisfied with 
erudition, it insists on knowledge. 

But such modernized instruction is actually less 
necessary in the life of a physician than it is in the 
life of a clergyman. The former pursues his daily 
course in an unobtrusive way ; the latter is compelled 
by his position to publicity. The congregations w^hom 
he must meet each Sabbath day, and, indeed, perhaps 
more frequently, are often too prone to substitute the 
right of criticism for a sentiment of simple devotion. 
Very few among them can appreciate the monotonous, 
the wearing strain of compulsory mental labor — labor 
that at a given hour must with punctuality be per- 
formed. On topics that have been thought about, 
and written about, and preached about for nearly 
twenty centuries, they are importunately and unrea- 
sonably demanding something new. 

In that ordeal the clergyman spends his existence. 
To maintain the respect that is. his due, there are but 
two things on which he can rely — purity of life and 
knowledge. Men unconsciously submit to the guid- 
ance of what they discern to be superior intelligence. 
Here comes into disastrous operation the defective 
organization of the theological seminaries. Content 
with such a knowledge of nature as might have an- 
swered a century ago, the imposing and ever-increas- 



EDUCATION OF THE CLERGY. 279 

ing body of modern science they decline. And yet it 
is that science and its practical applications which are 
now guiding the destinies of civilization. 

In my History of the Intellectual Development of 
Europe I have had occasion to consider the conse- 
quences of the Reformation, and may perhaps be ex- 
cused the following quotation : " America, in which, 
of all countries, the Reformation at the present mo- 
ment has farthest advanced, should offer to thought- 
ful men much encouragement. Its cities are filled 
with churches built by voluntary gifts; its clergy 
are voluntarily sustained, and are in all directions 
engaged in enterprises of piety, education, mercy. 
What a difference between their private life and that 
of ecclesiastics before the Reformation ! Not, as in 
the old times, does the layman look upon them as the 
cormorants and curse of society. They are his faith- 
ful advisers, his honored friends, under whose sugges- 
tion and supervision are instituted educational estab- 
lishments, colleges, hospitals, whatever can be of ben- 
efit to men in this life, or secure for them happiness 
in the life to come." 

No one can study the progress of modern civiliza- 
tion without being continually reminded of the great, 
it might be said, the mortal mistake committed by 
the Roman Church. Had it put itself forth as the 
promoter and protector of science, it would at this 
day have exerted an unquestioned dominion all over 



280 MONITION FROM THE ROMAN CHURCH. 

Europe. Instead of being the stumbling-block, it 
would have been the animating agent of human ad- 
vancement. It shut the Bible only to have it opened 
forcibly by the Reformation ; it shut the book of Na- 
ture, but has found it impossible to keep it closed. 
How different the result, had it abandoned the obso- 
lete absurdities of Patristicism, and become imbued 
with the spirit of true Philosophy — had it lifted it- 
self to a comprehension of the awful magnificence of 
the heavens above and the glories of the earth be- 
neath — had it appreciated the immeasurable vastness 
of the universe, its infinite multitude of worlds, its in- 
conceivable past duration ! How different, if in place 
of forever looking backward, it had only looked for- 
ward — bowing itself down in a world of life and light, 
instead of worshiping, in the charnel-house of antiqui- 
ty, the skeletons of twenty centuries ! How different, 
had it hailed with transport the discoveries and in- 
ventions of human genius, instead of scowling upon 
them with a malignant and baleful eye ! How dif- 
ferent, had it canonized the great men who have been 
the interpreters of Nature, instead of anathematizing 
them as Atheists ! 

In our national development it is for the American 
clergy to shun that great, that fatal mistake. It is 
for them to remember that the Reformation remains 
only half completed, until to the free reading of the 
Book of God there is added the free reading of the 



THE PRESS. 281 

Book of Nature. It is for them to remember that 
there are two volumes of Revelation — the Word and 
the Works ; and that it is the indefeasible right of 
every man to study and interpret them both, accord- 
ing to the light given him, without molestation or 
punishment. 

Since the invention of printing, the power of the 
pulpit has been subordinated to the power of the 
pre S3, which is continually gathering force from the 
increasing diffusion of education. In America the 
newspaper has become a necessary of life. It makes 
its successful appearance in villages of which the 
population would be considered, in other countries, 
inadequate for its support. Cheap reading is to be 
had every where. The consequence is, that all sides 
of a question are apt to be read. It is affirmed that 
the consumption of paper in America, for printing 
and writing, is more than that of England and France 
put together. 

By these various agencies rays of enlightenment 
pervade the land ; the general character of the people 
undergoing a continual improvement, manifested in 
the acquisition of a breadth of view and vigor of ac- 
tion. It is both important and interesting to com- 
pare communities whose improvement has been at- 
tempted on the moral principle alone, with the Amer- 
ican community, in which dependence is had on the 
intellectual. The people who approach most nearly 



282 MORAL AND INTELLECTUAL EDUCATION. 

to us, so far as origin and habits of life are concerned, 
are the English. For many centuries their social 
amelioration and political advancement were depend- 
ent on an appeal to morals. During the greater por- 
tion of that time the country had been Catholic, but 
then it had also been reformed — ever, as it will al- 
ways be, religious. In my History of the Intellectual 
Development of Europe, Chapter XXL, I have endeav- 
ored to estimate impartially the progress that had 
been made under that system, and to give a picture 
of the social state attained by its guidance. I think 
that any one who will turn to those pages will come 
to the conclusion that, even when thus persevermgly 
applied for many ages, under auspices of the most fa- 
vorable and varied kind, upon a people naturally de- 
sirous of improvement, the moral method fails to yield 
the results popularly imputed to it. 

No social problem can be presented to our contem- 
plation of higher importance. Shall we decide in fa- 
vor of the moral or the intellectual method ? the En- 
glish or the American system % For the sake of en- 
abling the reader to judge, I will present a brief ab- 
stract of some of the facts set forth in the chapter to 
which I have alluded. They are derived altogether 
from English sources, and to a considerable extent 
from the works of Lord Macaulay and Mr. Fronde. 

At the close of the seventeenth century London 
was the most populous capital in Europe ; yet it was 



ENGLAND IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY. 283 

dirty, ill built, without sanitary provisions. The 
deaths were one in twenty-three each year ; now, in 
a much more crowded population, they are not one 
in forty. Much of the country was heath, swamp, 
warren. Almost within sight of the city there was 
a tract twenty-five miles round nearly in a state of 
nature ; there were but three houses upon it. Wild 
animals roamed in all directions. 

Nothing more strikingly shows the social condition 
than the provisions for locomotion. In the rainy sea- 
sons the roads were all but impassable, justifying the 
epithet so often applied to them of being in a horrible 
state. Through such gullies, half filled with mud, car- 
riages were dragged, often by oxen, or, when horses 
were used, it was as much a matter of necessity as, in 
the city, a matter of display, to drive half a dozen of 
them. If the country was open, the track of the road 
was easily mistaken : it was no uncommon thing for 
persons to lose their way, and have to spend the night 
out in the open air. Between places of considerable 
importance the roads were very little known ; and 
such was the difficulty for wheeled carriages, that a 
principal mode of transport was by pack-horses, of 
which the passengers took advantage, stowing them- 
selves away between the packs. We shall probably 
not dissent from their complaint that this method of 
traveling was hot in summer and cold in winter. The 
usual charge for freight was thirty cents a ton per 



284 ENGLAND IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY. 

mile. Toward the close of the century, what were 
termed flying coaches were established: they could 
move at the rate of from thirty to fifty miles a day. 
Many persons thought the risk so great that it was a 
tempting of Providence to go in them. The mail-bag 
was carried on horseback at about five miles an hour. 
A penny -post had been established in the city, but 
with much difficulty; for many long-headed men, 
who knew very well what they were saying, had de- 
nounced it as an insidious " Popish contrivance." 

Only a few years before this period Parliament had 
resolved that "all pictures in the royal collection 
which contained representations of Jesus or the Vir- 
gin Mother should be burned. Greek statues were 
delivered over to Puritan stone-masons to be made 
decent." A little earlier, Lewis Muggleton had given 
himself out as the last and greatest of the prophets, 
having power to save or damn whom he pleased. It 
had been revealed to him that God is only six feet 
high, and the sun only four miles off. The country 
beyond the Trent was still in a state of barbarism, 
and near the sources of the Tyne there were peo- 
ple scarcely less savage than American Indians, their 
" half-naked women chanting a wild measure, while 
the men, with brandished dirks, danced a war-dance." 

At the beginning of the eighteenth century there 
were thirty -four counties without a printer. The 
only press in England north of the Trent was at 



ENGLAND IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY. 285 

York. As to private libraries, there were none de- 
serving the name. "An esquire passed for a great 
scholar, if Hudibras, Baker's Chronicle, Tarleton's 
Jests, and the Seven Champions of Christendom lay 
in his hall window." It might be expected that the 
women were ignorant enough, when very few men 
knew how to write correctly or even intelligibly, and 
it had become unnecessary for clergymen to read the 
Scriptures in the original tongues. 

Social discipline was very far from being of that 
kind which we call moral. The master whipped his 
apprentice, the pedagogue his scholar, the husband 
his wife. Public punishments partook of the genera] 
brutality. It was a day for the rabble when a cul- 
prit was set in the pillory, to be pelted with brick- 
bats, rotten eggs, and dead cats ; when women were 
fastened by the legs in the stocks at the market-place, 
or a pilferer flogged through the town at the cart tail, 
a clamor not unfrequently arising unless the lash were 
laid on hard enough " to make him howl." In pun- 
ishments of a higher kind these whippings were per- 
fectly horrible : thus Titus Oates, after standing twice 
in the pillory, was whipped, and, after an interval of 
a few days, whipped again. A virtuoso in these mat- 
ters gives us the incredible information that he count- 
ed as many as seventeen hundred stripes administered. 
So far from the community being shocked at such an 
exhibition, they appeared to agree in the sentiment, 



286 ENGLAND IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY. 

that " since his face could not be made to blush, it 
was well enough to try what could be done with his 
back" Such a hardening of heart was in no lit- 
tle degree promoted by the atrocious punishment of 
state offenders ; thus, after the decapitation of Mon- 
trose and Argyle, their heads decorated the top of the 
Tolbooth ; and gentlemen, after the rising of Mon- 
mouth, were admonished to be careful of their ways, 
by hanging in chains to their park gate the corpse of 
a rebel to rot in the air. 

To a debased public life private life corresponded. 
The houses of the rural population were huts covered 
with straw thatch ; their inmates, if able to procure 
fresh meat once a week, were considered to be in 
prosperous circumstances ; one half of the families in 
England could hardly do that. Children of six years 
old were not unfrequently set to labor. The lord of 
the manor spent his time in rustic pursuits, was not 
an unwilling associate of peddlers and drovers, knew 
how to ring a pig or shoe a horse; his wife and daugh- 
ters " stitched and spun, brewed gooseberry wine, cured 
marigolds, and made the crust for the venison pasty." 
Hospitality was displayed in immoderate eating and 
the drinking of beer, the guest not being considered 
as having done justice to the occasion unless he had 
gone under the table. The dining-room was uncar- 
peted, but then it was tinted with a decoction of "soot 
and small beer." The chairs were rush-bottomed. In 



ENGLAND IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY. 287 

London the houses were mostly of wood and plaster, 
the streets filthy beyond expression. After nightfall 
a passenger went at his peril, for chamber windows 
were opened and slop-pails unceremoniously emptied 
down. There were no lamps in the streets until Mas- 
ter Fleming established his public lanterns. As a 
necessary consequence, there were plenty of shoplift- 
ers, highwaymen, and burglars. 

As to the moral condition, it is fearfully expressed 
in the statement that men not unfrequently were 
willing to sacrifice their country for their religion. 
Hardly any person died who was not suspected to 
have been made away with by poison, an indication 
of the morality generally supposed to prevail among 
the higher classes. If such was the state of society 
in its serious aspect, it was no better in its lighter. 
"We can scarcely credit the impurity and immodesty 
of the theatrical exhibitions. What is said about 
them would be beyond belief, if we did not remem- 
ber that they were the amusements of a community 
whose ideas of female modesty and female sentiment 
were altogether different from ours. Indecent jests 
were put into the mouths of lively actresses, and the 
dancing was not altogether of a kind to meet our ap- 
proval. The rural clergy could do but little to with- 
stand this flood of immorality. Their social condition 
for the last hundred years had been rapidly declining; 
for, though the Church possessed among her dignita- 



288 ENGLAND IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY. 

ries great writers and great preachers, her lower or- 
ders, partly through the political troubles that had 
befallen the state, but chiefly in consequence of secta- 
rian bitterness, had been reduced to a truly menial 
condition. It was the business of the rich man's 
chaplain to add dignity to the dinner-table by saying 
grace " in full canonicals," but he was also intended 
to be a butt for the mirth of the company. " The 
young Levite," such was the phrase then in use, 
" might fill himself with the corned beef and the car- 
rots ; but, as soon as the tarts and cheesecakes made 
their appearance, he quitted his seat and stood aloof 
till he was summoned to return thanks for the re- 
past," the daintiest part of which he had not tasted. 
If need arose, he could curry a horse, " carry a parcel 
ten miles," or " cast up the farrier's bill." The " wages" 
of a parish priest were at starvation-point. The social 
degradation of the ecclesiastics is well illustrated by 
an order of Queen Elizabeth, that no clergyman 
should presume to marry a servant-girl without the 
consent of her master or mistress. 

In administering the law, whether in relation to 
political or religious offenses, there was an incredible 
atrocity. In London, the crazy old bridge over the 
Thames w T as decorated with grinning and mouldering 
heads of criminals, under an idea that these ghastly 
spectacles would fortify the common people in their re- 
solves to act according to law. The toleration of the 



ENGLAND IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY. 289 

times may be understood from a law enacted by the 
Scotch Parliament, May 8, 1685, that whoever preach- 
ed or heard in a conventicle should be punished with 
death and the confiscation of his goods. That such 
an infamous spirit should not content itself with mere 
dead-letter laws, there is too much practical evidence 
to permit any one to doubt. A silly laboring man, 
who had taken it into his head that he could not con- 
scientiously attend the Episcopal worship, was seized 
by a troop of soldiers, " rapidly examined, convicted 
of nonconformity, and sentenced to death in the pres- 
ence of his wife, who led one little child by the hand, 
and, it was easy to see, was about to give birth to an- 
other. He was shot before her face, the widow cry- 
ing out, in her agony, ' Well, sirs, well, the day of 
reckoning will come.' " Shrieking Scotch Covenant- 
ers were submitted to torture by crushing their knees 
flat in the boot. Women were tied to stakes on the 
sea-sands and drowned by the slowly advancing tide 
because they would not attend Episcopal worship, or 
branded on their cheeks and then shipped to Ameri- 
ca. Gallant but wounded soldiers were hung in Scot- 
land, for fear they should die before they could be got 
to England. In the troubles connected with Mon- 
mouth's rising, in one county alone, Somersetshire, 
two hundred and thirty -three persons were hanged, 
drawn, and quartered, to say nothing of military exe- 
cutions ; for the soldiers amused themselves by hang- 

T 



290 ENGLAND IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY. 

ing a culprit for each, toast they drank, and making 
the drums and fifes play, as they said, to his dancing. 
It is needless to recall such incidents as the ferocity 
of Kirk's lambs, for such was the name popularly giv- 
en to the soldiers of that colonel, in allusion to the 
Paschal Lamb they bore on their flag, or to the story 
of Tom Boilman, so nicknamed from his having been 
compelled by those veterans to seethe the remains of 
his quartered friends in melted pitch. Women, for 
such idle words as women are always using, w r ere 
sentenced to be whipped at the cart's tail through ev- 
ery market-town in Dorset. A lad named Tutching 
was condemned to be flogged once a fortnight for sev- 
en years. Eight hundred and forty-one human be 
ings, judicially condemned to transportation to the 
West India Islands, and suffering all the horrible 
pains of a slave-ship in the Middle Passage, "were 
never suffered to go on deck;" in the holds below, 
" all was darkness, stench, lamentation, disease, and 
death." One fifth of them were thrown overboard to 
the sharks before they reached their destination, and 
the rest obliged to be fattened before they could be 
offered in the market to the Jamaica planters. The 
court ladies, and even the queen herself, were so ut- 
terly forgetful of womanly mercy and common human- 
ity as to join in this infernal traffic. That princess re- 
quested that a hundred of the convicts should be giv- 
en to her. " The profit which she cleared on the car- 



INTELLECTUAL EDUCATION. 291 

go, after making a large allowance for those who died 
of hunger and fever during the passage, can not be 
estimated at less than a thousand guineas." 

Such incidents as that last mentioned would be in- 
credible, if not cited upon unimpeachable authority. 
It is that of Lord Macaulay, in his History of England. 
The advocates of the system of social improvement by 
an appeal to the moral, excluding the intellectual, have 
in this impartial representation of the state of that 
country, after a persevering trial of hundreds of years 
of that means, a proof of the failure of their well-meant 
but inadequate work. 

Why is it that such things are impossible now? 
The answer promptly given to such an inquiry is, 
that men are more enlightened. Exactly so. And 
does not that confession concede the principle I am 
endeavoring to enforce, that the improvement of so- 
ciety can only be accomplished through the intel- 
lect? 

The moral is, in its very nature, stationary. Alone 
it is incompetent to guide the advancement of society. 
Social elevation can only be accomplished by appeal- 
ing to the understanding, and that will influence the 
heart. 

Herein is the secret of the rapid development of 
American society, and the prodigious strength of 
American political institutions. If education were 
restricted to a class, instead of being given to all, the 



292 INTELLECTUAL EDUCATION. 

dead weight of the illiterate masses would keep ev- 
ery thing in stagnation. 

Whoever will examine the social condition of Eu- 
rope from the epoch of its conversion to the close of 
the seventeenth century, will not fail to perceive that 
its torpidity through so many ages was connected 
with the false system resorted to by the Italian au- 
thorities. Eome utterly rejected intellectual improve- 
ment; she struck it aside with an inexorable, often 
with a bloody hand. She fell into the political error 
of expecting to accomplish the development of society 
by methods that were essentially inadequate and sta- 
tionary. 

" Ignorance is the mother of Devotion" — of Super- 
stition, it should rather have been said. There can 
not be found in any country communities more relig- 
ious and more enlightened than American. Knowl- 
edge and morality, so far from being incompatible, 
are intimately allied. "Whatever improvement the 
latter is capable of, it must owe to the advancement 
of the former. 

It is amazing what delusions and impostures held 
an unquestioned position so long as that erroneous 
system was applied. It is amazing how they disap- 
peared when the better system was put in force. 
The moonlight has now no fairies, the solitude no ge- 
nius, the darkness no ghost, no goblin. There is no 
necromancer who can raise the dead from their graves, 



EXTINCTION OF SUPERSTITION. 293 

— no one who has sold his soul to the devil and signed 
the contract with his blood — no angry apparition to 
rebuke the crone who has disquieted him. Divina- 
tion, agroniancy, pyromancy, hydromancy, cheiroman- 
cy, augury, interpreting of dreams, oracles, sorcery, as- 
trology, are all gone. It is three hundred and fifty 
years since the last sepulchral lamp was found, and 
that was near Kome. There are no gorgons, hydras, 
chimeras, no familiars, no incubus or succubus. No 
longer do captains buy of Lapland witches favorable 
winds; no longer do our churches resound with 
prayers against the baleful influences of comets, 
though there still linger in some of our noble old 
rituals forms of supplication for dry weather and 
rain — useless but not unpleasing reminiscences of the 
past. The apothecary no longer says prayers over 
the mortar in which he is pounding, to impart a di- 
vine afflatus to his drugs. Who is there that now 
pays fees to a relic, or goes to a saint shrine to be 
cured ? These delusions have vanished, together with 
the night to which they appertained, yet they were 
the delusions of fifteen hundred years. In their sup- 
port might be produced a greater mass of human tes- 
timony than probably could be brought to bear on 
any other matter of belief in the entire history of 
man; and yet in the nineteenth century we have 
come to the conclusion that the whole, from the be- 
ginning to the end, was a deception. Let him, there- 



294 EXTINCTION OF SUPERSTITION. 

fore, who is disposed to balance the testimony of past 
ages against the dictates of his own reason ponder on 
this strange history. Let hirn who relies on the au- 
thority of human evidence in the guidance of his 
opinions, now settle with himself what that evidence 
is worth. 

The value of social methods is to be determined by 
an ascertainment of their practical working. We 
have only to compare the slow progress made by Eu- 
rope when under its moral education, with the rapid 
advancement of America under its intellectual educa- 
tion. How striking is the contrast between the in- 
fatuated supernaturalism of the one, and the plain 
common sense of the other ! For many successive 
centuries the former was a theatre of magic. It was 
not until the Reformation that an end was put to 
those disgraceful miracles that were a public scandal. 
As enlightenment advanced they could no longer be 
made to succeed. Even Rome, the workshop of those 
artifices, ceased to be the seat of that trade. They 
could never be imposed on America. 

But, though this continent rejected those impos- 
tures, it has been the scene of wonders of a very dif- 
ferent kind — miracles not ending when the enchanter 
ceased waving his wand, and requiring the authenti- 
cation of credible or credulous witnesses, but lasting 
for all time and open to all eyes. From the Atlantic 
shore-line to a vast distance in the interior the forests 



AMERICA IN HER EIRST CENTURY. 295 

that encumbered the ground have been cut down ; 
the gloomy waste has become fertile fields ; roads for 
hundreds of thousands of miles have been construct- 
ed ; rivers have been bridged ; canals have been dug. 
The self- multiplying force of society has at length 
here found unrestrained scope; the population in- 
creases with unparalleled rapidity. A network of 
iron, daily increasing in extent, has been spread ; tel- 
egraphic wires run in all directions. Great cities, with 
hundreds of thousands of inhabitants, have arisen. 
A large portion of Europe is fed by the harvests that 
are gathered ; a large portion of the human race turns 
hither for its clothing. The people on the borders of 
the great lakes can speak instantaneously to those on 
the Gulf of Mexico; those on the Atlantic and Pacific 
can do the same. Innumerable churches, and colleges, 
and hospitals are scattered over the land in all direc- 
tions. The ports are forests of masts. The flag of 
the country is seen on every sea and from every 
shore. 

A self-conscious democracy has wrung from its ri- 
vals and enemies the reluctant confession that " it is 
not fickle to its rulers, unstable in its policy, waver- 
ing in its determination;" that "it is not violent or 
cruel, nor too impatient of discipline and obedience 
to be inapt for military success ;" that u it will support 
the expenses of war and the burden of taxation." 
They speak of the opinions which Europe has held 



296 THE CIVIL WAR. 

on these points as "delusions' 1 unsafe any longer to en- 
tertain. It has also taught them the portentous les- 
son that " a despot is not necessary for the conducting 
of a great war/' in which there are engaged armies 
of a million of men and a navy of a thousand ships. 

These are a sample of the miracles that spring 
from Intelligence. Compare them with the miracles 
done in a corner — that spring from superstition. 
They are also the miracles of Peace. 

But there are also miracles of War. In a land 
where every man is free to think and free to act as 
he likes — where one might suppose that there would, 
of necessity, be a Babel hubbub of confusion, and so- 
ciety be only a rope of sand, the shot of a gun at their 
flag brought half a million of riflemen into the field. 
The waste of battle and the hospitals was for years 
more than supplied. With admirable energy, an iron- 
clad navy, that can match the navies of the world, 
was sent to sea. Never was there such an exhibition 
of public resolution and of private charity. If an 
army of a hundred thousand men melted away be- 
fore cannon and by fever, there was another army of 
a hundred and fifty thousand men put in its place. 
The wars of Europe, even those of the French Em- 
pire, were outdone in brilliancy and in result. The 
man of the Northwest hewed his way with his sword 
to the Gulf of Mexico by a river more than a thou- 
sand miles long, paving its bottom with the wrecks 



THE CIVIL WAR. 297 

of ships. The man of the Northeast executed march- 
es of more than two thousand miles, resistlessly cap- 
turing cities and subjugating states: there were tro- 
phies of thousands of guns. The mouth of the Mis- 
sissippi was forced by one of the most brilliant opera- 
tions in naval annals. The art of war, both by land 
and sea, was absolutely remodeled. Slavery, that, 
like a gnarled Upas-tree, had struck its roots into a 
country almost one fourth the size of Europe, was 
wrenched out of the earth. A track of grim desola- 
tion, of unutterable ruin, marked where the avenging 
cannon -wheels had passed. There were spent three 
thousand millions of dollars, and yet this people put 
off its armor more powerful, richer, better, than ever 
before. 

Is there any miracle the Old World can show 
the equal of that ? And what was it worked for ? 
For the sake of an Idea — that there shall exist on 
this continent one Eepublic, great and indivisible. 

Such, then, are the fruits of the culture of the In- 
tellect, such are the advantages the American has 
over the European system : in truth, it belongs to a 
higher stage of social life. We have already seen 
that, in the general plan of Nature, the direction of 
evolution is altogether toward the intellectual ; a con- 
clusion equally impressed upon us whether our mode 
of examination be anatomical or historical. Anatom- 
ically we find no provision in the nervous system for 



298 MORAL AND INTELLECTUAL PROGRESS. 

the improvement of the moral, save indirectly through 
the intellectual, the whole aim of development being 
for the sake of intelligence. Historically, in the same 
manner, we find that the intellectual has always led 
the way in social advancement, the moral having been 
subordinate thereto. The former has been the main- 
spring of the movement, the latter passively affected. 
It is a mistake to make the progress of society depend 
on that which is itself controlled by a higher power. 
In the earlier and inferior stages of individual life we 
may govern through the moral alone. In that way 
we may guide children, but it is to the understanding 
of the adult that we must appeal. A system work- 
ing only through the moral must, sooner or later, 
come into antagonism with the intellectual, and if it 
does not contain within itself a means of adaptation 
to the changing circumstances, must in the end be 
overthrown. This was the grand error of that Ro- 
man system which presided while European civiliza- 
tion was developing. It assumed as its basis a uni- 
form, a stationary psychological condition in man. 
Forgetting that the powers of the mind grow with 
the possessions of the mind, it considered those who 
lived in past generations as being in no respect men- 
tally inferior to those who are living now, though our 
children at sixteen may have a wider range of knowl- 
edge than our ancestors at sixty. That such an im- 
perfect system could exist for so many ages is a proof 



MORAL AND INTELLECTUAL PROGRESS. 299 

of a contemporary condition of undeveloped intellect, 
as Ave see that the understanding; of a child does 
not revolt against the moral suasion, often intrinsical- 
ly feeble, with which we attempt to influence him. 
But it would be as unphilosophical to treat with dis- 
dain the ideas that have served as a guide in the ear- 
lier ages of European life, as to look with contempt 
on the motives that have guided us in youth. Their 
feebleness and incompetency are excused by their suit- 
ability to the period of life to which they are applied. 

But whoever considers these things will see that 
there is a term beyond which the application of such 
methods can not be extended. The head of a family 
would act unwisely if he attempted to apply to his 
son at twenty-one the methods he had successfully 
used at ten: such methods could only be rendered 
effective by a resort to physical compulsion. A great 
change in the intervening years has taken place, and 
ideas once intrinsically powerful can exert their influ- 
ence no more. The moral may have remained un- 
changed, it may be precisely as it was — no better, no 
worse ; but that which has changed is the understand- 
ing. Keasoning and inducements of an intellectual 
kind are now needful. 

If it is thus with the individual, it is likewise so 
with humanity. For centuries nations may live un- 
der forms that meet their requirements — forms suita- 
ble to a feeble state; but it is altogether illusory to 



300 DEVELOPMENT OF GEEEK LIFE. 

suppose that such an adaptedness can continue for- 
ever. A critical eye discerns that the mental features 
of a given generation have become different from those 
of its ancestors. New ideas and a new manner of ac- 
tion are the tokens that a modification has silently 
taken place. Though after a short interval the change 
might not amount to much, in the course of time there 
must inevitably be exhibited the spectacle of a society 
that had outgrown its forms, its rules of life. 

In the work from which I have so frequently quoted 
I have considered in detail the theme here presented, 
and have endeavored to show that there is a complete 
analogy between individual and national life. Se- 
lecting for preliminary examination the only Euro- 
pean nation offering a complete and completed intel- 
lectual life, and out of the five general topics that 
might be resorted to — philosophy, science, literature, 
religion, government — using the first as best suited 
for the purpose, I have endeavored to ascertain the 
characteristics of Greek mental development, expect- 
ing to find that the younger members of the European 
family, more or less distinctly, would offer illustrations 
of the same mode of advancement ; and that, indeed, 
the whole continent, which is the aggregate of these 
separate elements, would in its secular progress com- 
port itself in a like way. From such an examination 
it appears that the whole movement in question is of 
a nature answering to that observed in an individual, 



DEVELOPMENT OE GREEK LIEE. 301 

and, like it, conveniently separable into arbitrary pe- 
riods sufficiently distinct from one another. In suc- 
cession there may be observed an age of credulity, an 
age of inquiry, an age of faith, an age of reason, an 
age of decrepitude. The first, the age of credulity, 
which had filled the Mediterranean Sea with mon- 
sters and marvels, was closed by geographical discov- 
ery ; the second, which includes the Ionian, the Pytha- 
gorean, the Eleatic philosophies, was ended by the 
criticisms of the Sophists ; the third, embracing the 
Socratic and Platonic, by the doubts of the Skeptics ; 
the fourth, ushered in by the Macedonian expedition 
in a material sense, and in a philosophical by Aris- 
totle and the Stoics, and adorned by the splendid 
achievements of the Alexandrian school, degenerated 
into imbecility, Neo-platonism, and mysticism; and 
the hand of Rome put an end to the fifth. In the 
mental progress of this people we therefore discern 
the forthshadowing of a career like that of individual 
life — a career of which the epochs answer to those of 
infancy, childhood, youth, manhood, old age. 

Is there not a wide step from the simple, and, in- 
deed, childlike inquiries of the Ionians as to the pri- 
mary element, to the majestic speculations and abiding 
faith of Platonism, and another to that exact science 
which culminated in the Museum of Alexandria, and 
still another to the superstition of Plotinus? The 
strong man of Stoicism had degenerated into the su- 



302 DEVELOPMENT OF GREEK LIFE. 

perannuated dotard, full of admiration for the past, 
of contemptuous disgust for the present, his thoughts 
wandering back to the things that had occupied him 
in his youth and even in his infancy. In this its 
closing scene, Greek philosophy is garrulity and mys- 
ticism. 

From the solution of the four great problems of 
Greek philosophy given in each of the five stages of 
its life, it is not difficult to determine the law of the 
variation of Greek opinion, and to show its analogy 
to that of the variation of the opinions in individual 
life. A supreme interest gathers round such an analy- 
sis when we compare what was here accomplished 
with what had been done in the same direction by 
the ancestry of the Indo-Germanic nations in Asia; 
when we see emerging in Europe, spontaneously or 
willingly adopted, the majestic ideas of India, where 
man had risen to the grand conception of a multiplic- 
ity of worlds in infinite sjmce, and a succession of 
worlds in infinite time. 

And now it may be clearly shown that these 
phases of Greek intellect are already in part repeated 
in the life of Europe, though it is a continent of many 
meteorological contrasts, and has a varied surface of 
relief, and is therefore full of modified men. For it, 
too, there have been successive ages. An age of cre- 
dulity, the old Pagan times, was ended by the spread 
of the power of republican Rome ; a period then in- 



EPOCHS OF EUROPEAN LIFE. 303 

tervenes up to the foundation of Constantinople — it 
is one of inquiry ; then follows an age of faith, the 
Turkish invasion of Europe marking its close. The 
harbingers of the age of reason were maritime discov- 
ery and philosophical criticism ; the former being still 
more effective in its operation than in ancient times, 
for it dislocated the centre of material activity and 
the centre of intellect, changing the front of Europe 
from the north shore of the Mediterranean Sea to the 
Atlantic Ocean, and forced nations that had hitherto 
lain eccentrically and in comparative obscurity into 
the very van of the new movement. 

This regular advance of Europe toward its age of 
reason was to no small extent affected by two agen- 
cies, to which it would appear that sufficient import- 
ance has not yet been attached. The first of these 
was altogether scientific ; it was the influence of the 
Jewish physicians. Its range is over a period of more 
than seven centuries. The second, the Arabian ac- 
tion, was partly intellectual and partly political. Of 
all the incidents of European life, this is the most 
misunderstood and undervalued. 

From the age that could accept without question 
the scientific ideas of patristicism, to that which de- 
lighted in the abstruse metaphysics of Abelarcl, there 
is a very great step ; there is also another very great 
one before we reach the a^e of Newton. At interme- 
diate periods, a much shorter space apart, the varia- 



304 EPOCHS OF EUROPEAN LIFE. 

tions in the movement are so distinct, and their gen- 
eral tendency so obvious, that for an observing man 
to have overlooked them seems almost an impossibil- 
ity. To assert that the earth is stationary is a much 
less surprising error than to assert the mental immo- 
bility of man ; yet it is very well known that even so 
lately as the seventeenth century this doctrine was 
the basis of the European political system. 

This gradual process of intellectual development, 
shown so strikingly by the past history of Europe, so 
strikingly in its present life, is destined, necessarily, 
likewise to be shown by America ; 

" For, I doubt not, through the ages an increasing purpose 
runs, 
And the thoughts of men are widened by the process of 

the suns." 

Here the direction of the movement is altogether to- 
ward the intellectual. The advance is so rapid, the con- 
sequent material results are so prodigious, that they 
seem more like the castle-building of a wild romancer 
than the calculated realities of a political economist. 

From that intellectual aspect which in so marked 
a manner it is fast assuming, it is plain that this con- 
tinent is destined for ages to be the seat of a conflict 
of ideas. 

The law of action and reaction obtains as com- 
pletely in the collisions of human opinion as in the 
mechanical collisions of bodies. An idea can not 



THE PROGRESS OF AN IDEA. 305 

make its way through nations without receiving 
from them a special impress, and becoming modified 
by the ideas it encounters. Whatever may be its in- 
nate force, whatever its massiveness, it is influenced 
by them in proportion to their firmness or their 
power. 

Such is undoubtedly the true effect, but very often 
it assumes a deceptive aspect. When a stone falls to 
the earth, the earth rises through a definite distance 
to meet the stone, and the amount of motion accom- 
plished by each is capable of an exact scientific de- 
termination ; but, considering the relative masses of 
the two bodies, we may, for all practical purposes, 
without sensible error, neglect the movement of the 
greater, and consider the descending stone as alone 
affected. 

So with an Idea : its massiveness and its moment- 
um may long preserve it without sensible modifica- 
tion. For practical purposes, it, too, may be consid- 
ered as unaffected, though, correctly speaking, it is 
slowly undergoing change. 

A new idea intruding itself among old ones will 
probably meet with resistance from them — a resist- 
ance often arising in part from their philosophical na- 
ture, and in part from material interests that may 
have gathered round them. Its progress is, however, 
facilitated by that innate tendency to a change of 
thought which affects all men ; for that in every indi- 

U 



306 RESISTANCE TO NEW IDEAS. 

viclual there is a tendency to such a continuous varia- 
tion of thought, no one can doubt who examines his 
own mental state at periods separated by a few years, 
and compares it with that of other persons examined 
at like epochs. The change observed in each is com- 
mon to all, even though some may perhaps manifest 
it in a manner' less conspicuous than others. The 
generality of the fact indicates that it originates in 
conditions to which all are subject ■ and that in na- 
tions there is a similar progression, may be readily 
proved by a superficial examination of their social 
state. In the progress of human affairs there arise 
classes of men w r ho through their interests are identi- 
fied with, existing forms of opinion, and who manifest 
an extreme jealousy of any divergence from those 
forms. At first, because of the strength of public 
opinion coinciding with them and the feebleness of 
the commencing dissent, that jealousy may be grati- 
fied in open and violent persecution ; but as the force 
of coinciding public opinion gradually declines, and 
the divergence or dissent gathers power, though the 
opposition may be none the less bitter, it is obliged 
to act in a more masked or insidious way. Eventu- 
ally, through the continued operation of the same 
causes, even such indirect action ceases. 

Many illustrations of these principles might be 
given, but one will suffice : it is the manner in w^hich 
astronomical ideas have forced their way. Consider- 



RESISTANCE TO NEW IDEAS. 307 

ing the probable consequences that might arise from 
the establishment of the Copernican system, particu- 
larly as respects the relative insignificance of our 
earth among such countless myriads of worlds, very 
many of which, by their size and importance, seem to 
be of inconceivably greater worth — considering the 
incompatibility of such views with the notion gen- 
erally held in the Middle Ages that the universe was 
made for man, that its object and aim were altogether 
subordinate to human interests, it could not be other- 
wise than that opposition to so dangerous a diver- 
gency of thought should arise. Accordingly, it showed 
itself in the first period in a violent manner, seeking 
to extinguish the apparent heresy by the personal de- 
struction or persecution of those who had fallen into 
it. But this by degrees passed away, and more mod- 
erate though more insidious methods were adopted. 
After a few T years that opposition ceased. It is by 
no means the least interesting feature of these events 
that so great a resistance was thus successfully over- 
come, not alone against ancient authority, but even, 
as it w^ere, against common sense ; for he who adopts 
the philosophical doctrine of the globular figure of 
the earth, and assigns to it its true place as a mem- 
ber of the solar system, must question the evidence 
of his own eyes in matters that seem so incontestible 
as the rising and setting of the sun, and the actual ef- 
fect of immense mountain ranges and great valleys in 
disturbing that globular form. 



308 RESISTANCE TO NEW IDEAS. 

Whenever we see force applied for the controlling 
of ideas, whether it be in an open or in an indirect 
way, we may be sure that it is because material in- 
terests are in jeopardy, and that the power of the 
opinions on which they depend is becoming weak, 
and they themselves approaching to their end. 

This example may also serve as an illustration of 
the manner in which the minds of men tend to unity 
of opinion in cases where knowledge of absolute truth 
is attainable, though they may be under very diverse 
interests. This, indeed, is the characteristic of exact 
science, that it spontaneously compels such a uniform- 
ity. In a question of arithmetic, no one contends 
against the true solution, though his personal inter- 
ests may be opposed to it. In questions of geometry, 
neither the steps of the demonstration nor the conclu- 
sions are ever disputed, and the same holds good in 
questions of physics. Once let the true solution be 
reached, and it spontaneously compels universal as- 
sent. The exact solution of any such question, no 
matter what its bearing may be, forthwith becomes 
an undisputed rule of action, from which no person, 
if even he had the wish, could ever free himself. In 
the anarchy of opinion now prevailing on many points 
of interest to the well-being of society, this gives con- 
fidence to the hopes of the philosopher, for he sees 
that, year by year, the dominion of reason is spread- 
ing, and that men deliver themselves unreservedly to 



RESISTANCE TO NEW IDEAS. 309 

it ; he sees that the essential weakness of many old 
forms of opinion w^as, in a great measure, attributable 
to this, that they led to a division of society into two 
unequal classes — a small one, which set itself above 
reason, and an immensely large one, which was be- 
neath reason ; the former outraging truth by the most 
audacious inventions for deceiving the-latter, who, on 
their part, were the more completely duped the more 
transparent and preposterous the fraud. The one 
stood aloof from Reason because it w r as unsuited to 
their practices, the other declined it because it w r as in- 
consistent with their credulity. Institutions founded 
on such a state of things can have no innate strength, 
and only continue through the dexterous application 
of shifting expedients. But very different is it when 
men, instead of depreciating and distrusting Reason, 
put themselves unreservedly under its control : thence 
must arise unanimity, and unanimity is strength. 

To the bar of common sense must be brought all 
ideas, whatsoever they may be, to receive their final 
judgment ; and this, not only as respects those that 
are of a physical, but also those of a moral kind. 
There is no other course for it now in the world. 
Reason offers the only authority which men of all na- 
tions will acknowledge. Indeed, it is the recognition 
of this axiom which leads the European to the ex- 
pectation that all other people will eventually adopt 
his faith, in view of the strong evidences he can pre- 



310 RESISTANCE TO NEW IDEAS. 

sent to them of its truth, and the unreasonableness 
of the ideas which they and their ancestors have fol- 
lowed; but what else is this than the exaltation of 
Reason above Authority? What other interpreta- 
tion can we give of the numerous apologies and ar- 
guments put forth in their day by the different forms 
of faith ? Are they not all essentially based upon 
the principle that Eeason is the only, and must be the 
final judge ? — that supernatural testimony must wait 
upon her decisions, and that faith is only sure when it 
is founded on common sense ? How otherwise than 
upon this principle can we hope to bring the Bud- 
dhist and the Mohammedan from their fallacies — fal- 
lacies which at this moment are beguiling the great- 
er part of the human race ? 

What I have just said respecting the modifications 
an idea must undergo through its collision with other 
ideas may be generalized. Entire systems of philoso- 
phy are liable to similar effects. They are nothing 
but modes of thought ; and when they intrude them- 
selves among dissimilar modes of thought, mutual dis- 
placements and alterations must ensue. The expect- 
ations of those who look forward to a glorious career 
for all nations of the earth in common, each catching 
a share of the enthusiasm and each contributing a 
share to the advance, are founded upon the effect 
which they suppose must ensue from the diffusion of 
our own power and enlightenment. What, they ex- 



RESISTANCE TO NEW IDEAS. 31 1 

claim, will be the grand result, when our knowledge 
and ideas have become the common property of the 
world ! What will it be when, by the printing-press, 
the telegraph, and other modern appliances, all men 
are brought in close interconnection, and, indeed, in in- 
stantaneous intercommunication ! I would ask them 
to observe, for it is true that we stand on the brink 
of those events, what was the result to the ancient 
Greek philosophies, when, after the rise of Athens to 
political supremacy, they were all mingled together 
and compared together. Was it not the total destruc- 
tion of them all ? Brought into contact, as it were, 
at a common central point, none could gain an abso- 
lute predominance over all the rest. I would also 
ask them to look at the result of the supremacy of 
Eome — of her policy of patronizing all the forms of 
Paganism, and bringing them at one point in contact : 
again, was it not the utter destruction of them all % 
And so it must be when European systems of thought 
come into contact and conflict with Asiatic, as they will 
before long do, by the increasing means of intercom- 
munication, which are in reality equivalent to central- 
ization : each will no longer be measured by its own 
partial standard, but all must be submitted to that of 
a more general — nay, even of a universal kind. From 
such a conflict I do not believe that any would come 
forth without at least exhibiting marks of the most 
profound modification; and for the weaker Asiatic 



312 THE POWER OF IDEAS IN AMERICA. 

there seems to be no other issue than absolute de- 
struction for all those parts that are not intrinsically 
true. 

The American political system is founded on the 
principle of public intellectual culture. Recognizing 
the truth of the maxim that ideas govern the world, 
it rests its hopes on universal education. In this re- 
spect it differs essentially from its European contem- 
poraries. They furnish enlightenment to certain class- 
es only, not to the lower social strata. 

Such a repressive policy can, however, never impart 
intrinsic strength to a community, as those who de- 
vised and those who adopted it supposed. The inse- 
curity of Europe, whose civilization hangs over an 
awful gulf, and the strength of America, whose devel- 
opment is proceeding with so much energy, are each 
due to the course that has been followed in this re- 
spect. In Europe men grope about in political dark- 
ness, not knowing whither they are going, and afraid 
to look into the future. In America, the sentiment 
of a manifest destiny to imperial greatness gives to 
every one a determinate direction and an energetic 
life. 

While the Slave States existed as a political power, 
they were forced by the necessities of their position 
to adopt the European maxim, and impose a forced 
ignorance on the low elements of their society. Had 



CENTRALIZATION IN AMERICA. 313 

they clone otherwise, the spark of enlightenment 
would quickly have kindled into a volcanic, devour- 
ing flame. But, since their overthrow in the Civil 
War, maxims of a very different, an opposite kind — 
those that have given such unparalleled power to the 
East, the North, the West — will come into play. 
There will be a harmony of action over the whole 
continent. 

Intellectual development necessarily implies cen- 
tralization; but, as we have seen in the foregoing 
pages, centralization is not incompatible with self- 
government; in fact, it may be the logical issue of 
democratic principles. It is through the working of 
this great truth that the Republic has passed through 
its inferior stage of life — the epoch of state sovereign- 
ties. At that time it was in the condition of one of 
those animated forms that have a dozen or more dif- 
ferent nerve centres, each acting independently of the 
rest, or joining in concert only as suited itself, and 
hardly acknowledging the power of any central gov- 
erning organ. But, as in animated nature and in in- 
dividual man concentration accompanies development, 
so in national life there is an inevitable tendency to 
convergence, and to the conferring on a predetermined 
part a dominant control. 

The practical working of these principles may be 
very advantageously studied in the pages of ecclesias- 
tical history, which furnishes a lesson deserving the 



314 EXAMPLE FROM ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY. 

attention of every American — a beacon that may 
guide in the right path, that may warn from error. 
The first Christian communities established in Syria, 
Asia Minor, and elsewhere throughout the Koman 
Empire, present many highly interesting social anal- 
ogies to the first American colonies. Their churches 
were the only political embodiments that were per- 
missible or possible, and of them the constitution was 
essentially democratic, power being diffused in the 
congregation. The independent existence they main- 
tained was by degrees modified, church affiliating 
with church, gathering thereby protection and con- 
ferring power. The individual helplessness they at 
first exhibited was exchanged for security. In a very 
short time, as concentration and centralization went 
on, a ruling personage emerged from among his cler- 
ical peers, who, passing into subordination, acknowl- 
edged his authority. The same tendency still un- 
ceasingly continuing, the bishops, in their turn, per- 
mitted a superior. In the time of Constantine, so 
completely had this process of centralization gone on, 
that power was ready to converge into the three great 
sees of Koine, Constantinople, Alexandria. Then came 
the struggle between them for supremacy. The an- 
nals of Europe for many years are its history. Event- 
ually, the Bishop of Eome became the paramount au- 
thority over all. 

There are but two elements of government — Faith 



EXAMPLE FROM ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY. 315 

and Force. During the greater portion of its civilized 
life, Europe has been under the dominion of the for- 
mer. For many centuries its kings were nothing 
more than lieutenants of the Sovereign Pontiff. In 
assigning, as we so commonly do, a superiority to the 
political over the ecclesiastical element in the history 
of that continent, we fall into a misapprehension : we 
adopt the views of those who consider only the inte- 
grant or constituent states, and not the view that 
ought to be adopted from a contemplation of their 
aggregate — the continent; for there was a time, a 
long time, in which ecclesiasticism discharged those 
international relationships that are now discharged 
by diplomacy. In Eome resided the animating, the 
uniting principle of all. 

Those Christian Congresses that pass under the des- 
ignation of Councils are not without their analogues 
in the American political system. To us there can 
be nothing more interesting than to study their re- 
lations with the executive Papal authority — how it 
called them into action when its purposes required, 
and how, when its statesmanship indicated, it evaded 
or declined to permit their continued existence. How 
different the result, had a Senate of Christendom been 
possible — a supreme authoritative body, with the 
Pope as its first executive officer ! There were often 
great men who saw that that was the chief necessity 
of their times ; there were Councils that attempted to 
accomplish it. 



316 EXAMPLE FROM ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY. 

Ill the history of this wonderful power, that for a 
thousand years maintained its sway, the American, I 
repeat, may find abundant instruction. Only let him 
divest his mind of the impression that there was any 
thing supernatural about it, for that serves to dimin- 
ish its intrinsic merit as the most extraordinary and 
most successful of human political conceptions carried 
into practical operation. He may realize from it the 
inevitable course through which all enduring human 
associations must pass. He may see how, in its lim- 
ited sphere, it depended on the same principles on 
which he is depending. It signified nothing to the 
Church that her greatest dignitaries had come from 
the lowest social ranks. Mental capacity was what 
she sought ; she appropriated it wherever she could 
find it. Considering the intrinsic weakness of the in- 
tellectual basis on which she rested, considering how 
incompatible it was with increasing enlightenment, 
our admiration may be worthily excited by the won- 
drous duration of her power. In that we may per- 
ceive auspices of the most favorable kind for our- 
selves, who likewise are making every thing depend 
on the organization of intellect ; not, however, as she 
did, for securing the stability of what, at the most, 
was only an institution, but for a nation ; not resting 
ourselves, as she did, on the supernatural, which is in 
its very nature delusive and unsatisfactory, but on 
Reason, which is enduring. Italian ecclesiasticism 



CONCLUSION. 317 

was necessarily a specialty ; American republicanism 
is for a continent. The one was mainly concerned in 
perpetuating the power of a guild ; the other is in- 
tended indiscriminately for all classes of men. But a 
philosophical study of the political history of the for- 
mer — its transcendent successes as well as its conspic- 
uous misfortunes — the course of events through which 
it passed — the profound knowledge it displayed of 
men, and, it may "be emphatically added, of women 
too, who constitute a most important element of na- 
tional life — the modes of action it observed toward 
antagonizing influences — its equanimity in the me- 
ridian splendor of its power — its tenacity of purpose, 
as inexorable as the grave in adversity — these are 
things which we, who are commencing a career of 
grandeur in a parallel direction, also requiring demo- 
cratic principles to be co-ordinated with self-govern- 
ment, and that with organization of intellect and con- 
centration of power, may find to be worthy of our 
most profound attention. 



INDEX. 



Abderrahman III. introduces cotton, 

118. 
Abelard, 303. 

African slaves first imported, 131. 
Age of Earth, 32. 
Ages of Greek life, 300. 
Agricultural colleges, 168. 
Agriculture, Egyptian, 67. 
Air, slow changes in, 30. 
Alexander the Great, his policy, 99. 
Alexandria ruins, Greece, 100. 
America, consequences of discovery of, 
95. 

domestic life in, 85. 

effects of climate in, 78, 80. 

locomotion in, 84. 

neutralization of climate in, 82. 

policy of, 78. 
American clergy, 279. 

continent, position of, 92. 

immigration, 101, 102. 

Indians, 96. 
Americanization in the West, 174. 
Animal, its nature, 15. 
Animals and Plants, their relation, 21. 

extinction of, 32. 

hot-blooded, 31. 
Antiochus Epiphanes, 208. 
Arabia, description of, 179, 180. 
Arabian emigration, 112. 

ideas, their influence, 198. 
Arabizing of countries, 112. 
Ararat, its plants, 38. 
Archetype of society, 248. 
Arkwright, inventions of, 123, 151. 
Aristotle, 241. 

followed by Arabs, 192. 
Art in Europe, ]41, 142. 

spontaneous, 140. 



Asia, climate of, 68. 

political state of, 76. 

stagnation of, 56. 

synthetic mind of, 75. 

tends to religion, 72. 

topography of, 68. 
Asiatic empires, peculiarities of, 107. 

women, their beauty, 114. 
Asiatics have lost locomotion, 70. 

have lost sense of improvement, 71. 
Athens, destruction of philosophy in, 

311. 
Atlantic plain, 49. 

States, condition of, 166. 

States, their people, 165. 
Atmosphere, nature of, 213. 

receptacle of dead, 23. 

unchangeable, 22, 30. 
Augustus, enactments of, 110. 
Aurora, 227. 
Australian emigration, 98. 

population, 137. 
Automatons, 243. 
Averroes, 195. 
Averroism, influence in Europe, 197. 

propagation of, 196. 



Babylonian captivity, its effect, 202. 

conquests, 100. 
Bagdad, schools of, 192. 
Baines on cotton manufacture, 125. 
Barbarians, their changes, 111. 
Bell, his inventions, 125. 
Belligerent rights, 266. 
Berengar the heretic, 81. 
Bleaching, 124. 
Blood admixture, 106, 163. 

admixture affects thought, 108. 

adulteration, 108. 



320 



INDEX. 



Blood, uses of, 90. 
Blue-eyed men, 42. 
Botero, F., 153. 
Brain, 246, 260. 

doubleness of, 44. 
Brindley's inventions, 126. 
Brutus, spectre of, 185. 
Buffalo migrations, 24. 
Byzantine policy, 235. 



Ceesar, peasantry in the time of, 42. 

puts premium on marriage, 109. 
Calico printing, 125. 
California, 91. 
Canal system, 121. 
Caravanserai, 70. 
Carthaginian power, 99 
Castes in Egypt, 162. 
Castle building, 45. 
Catacombs, Egyptian, 64. 
Caucasus, inhabitants of, 42. 
Celibacy, public, 155. 
Central Europe, former state of, 104. 
Centralization and self-government. 
268. 

in ecclesiasticism, 314. 
Centre of population, 146, 147. 
Cephalic ganglia, 245. 
Chadizah, 186. 

Character in North and South, 53. 
Chemise, 117. 
Chiapa, Bishop of, 97. 
China, education in, 83. 

organization of, 250, 261. 
Chinese canal, 74. 

emigration, 91, 171. 

mode of government, 272. 

wall, 74. 
Christian churches, their example, 314. 
Christianity, its place of origin, 108. 
Church, Roman, its example, 316. 
Circumnavigation of earth, 231. 
Civil war, 80. 

effects of, 85, 171. 
Classical instruction, 275. 
Claudius, his speech, 148, 150. 
Clergy, American, 279. 

education of, 275. 
Clergymen, mode of life of, 278. 
Climate, effect on Asiatics, 71. 

effect on brain, 47. 



Climate, excessive, 51. 

United States, 51. 

varieties of American, 55. 
Clouds, 225. 

Coal produced from the air, 30. 
Coffee from Arabia, 73. 
Colleges, multiplication of, 168. 
Colony, life of, 59. 
Colonies, their weakness, 100. 
Colonization of Europe, 135. 
Colosse, Egyptian, 64. 
Colossus a type of Egypt, 67. 
Columbia River, 51. 
Columbus, 89. 

refers to Averroes, 196. 

voyage of, 230. 
Common sense decides ideas, 309. 
Comparative history, 62. 

philology, 135. 
Complexion, changes in, 40. 
Conscience, its effects, 175. 
Conservation of force, 193. 
Conservatism, its cause, 160. 
Constantine opposes science, 212. 
Constitution, qualities of, 60. 
Constructive affinity of democracy, 266. 
Copernican theory established, 307. 
Cotton manufacture, 116, 122. 

quantity of, 131. 
Councils of the Church, 315. 
Crime on river banks, 35. 

tendency of men to, 35. 

tendency of women to, 36 
Crompton's inventions, 123, 151. 
Crusades, 88, 95, 146. 
Currents in the sea, 221. 

D. 

Debt, American, 177. 
De Gama, 89. 
Delos a slave market, 99. 
Delusions, cause of, 183. 
Demagogues, 60, 79. 
Democracy in Europe and America, 
265. 

self-conscious, 295. 
Desert of the West, 50. 
Differentiation and growth, 252. 

of communities, 257. 

political, 254. 
Dilution of blood, 107. 
Doctrine of human unity, 143. 



INDEX. 



321 



Dog, wild, 135. 
Domestic life in 
Dominicans, 195. 

E. 

Earth, modifications of, 30. 
Earthquake of Lisbon, 187. 
Eastern habits, introduction of, 172. 
Education, 46, 82. 

Chinese, 83. 

universal, 249, 268, 272. 
Egypt, art of, 140. 

history of, 63,162. 

immobility of, 68. 

permanence of, 67. 
El Dorado, 96. 
Electrical discoveries, 228. 
Emanation of souls, 193. 
Emigration, Australian, 98. 

Chinese, 91. 

effects of, 48, 93, 94, 105. 

English, 97, 101. 

Greek, 98. 

principles of, 95. 

Puritan, 101. 

Spanish, 96. 
Empires, chain of, 61. 
England in 17th century, 282. 
English population doubles, 146. 
Ennui, national, 90. 
Esdras, Book of, 206. 
Europe, analytical mind of, 75. 

ancient colonization of, 136. 

autochthons of, 137. 

Central, its former state, 104. 

effect of Crusades on, 88. 

effect of mercantile activity, 89. 

males and females in, 113. 

women of, 115. 

tends to philosophy, 72. 

union in, 81. 
European life, epochs of, 303. 
Evaporation, 224. 
Ezra, 207. 

E. 

Factory system, 123. 
Fakirs, Asiatic, 72. 
Families, large Arabian, 113. 
Famines and drouths predetermine 

27. 
Fetish worship in Egypt, 137. 



Finnish language, 136. 

Fish migrations, 24. 

Flame of lamp, its destiny, 62. 

Florida, climate of, 51. 

Food, its uses, 20. 

Force comes from the sun, 20. 

conservation of, 193. 
France, relative strength of, 129. 
Franciscans, 195. 
Franklin, experiments of, 228. 
Free blacks, 132. 
Freedom, intellectual, 236. 
French emigration, 103. 

G. 

Galileo, 127. 
Galvanism, 229. 
Gas, nature of, 215. 

wells, 74. 
Geological discovery, 247. 

variations in Asia, 69. 
Georgia abolishes slave-trade, 131. 
German movements in Europe, 95. 
Germinal membrane, 246. 
Glaciers, 227. 
Glass windows, 43. 
Goths, their emigration, 104. 
Government through morals and intel- 
lect, 268. 
Great Britain, emigration from, 105. 
Great Exhibition, cotton at, 120. 
Greek art, 141. 

emigration, 98. 

legends, origin of, 64. 

mental development, 300. 
Gregory VII., his policy, 81. 
Growth and differentiation, 252. 
Gulf Stream, 25,145,221. 

H. 

Habitation, permanent, its result, 160. 
Hargreaves, inventions of, 123, 151. 
Heat, effects of, 55. 

intrinsic of earth, 31. 
Hebrews, philosophical progress of, 204. 
Hindoo cotton manufacture, 119. 
History, comparative, 62. 
Holy wars, 95. 
Homestead, love of, 84. 
Homogeneousness, national, 107. 
Hordes, Asiatic, their emigrations, 69. 
Humboldt on plants, 38. 

X 



322 



INDEX. 



Icebergs, 227. 

Ideas, controlling of, 308. 

force of, 178, 239. 

force of Mohammedan, 187. 

impelling and resisting, 198. 

indigenous, 137. 

new, resistance to, 30G. 

progress of, 305. 
Immigration, American, 101. 
Immobility of institutions, 58. 
Impressment, 102. 
Inca, Peruvian, 96. 
India, conquest of, 151. 

emigration to, 103. 

inertness of, 121. 
Indians, American, 96. 

their conversion, 159. 
Individual analogy with nation, 13,16 

emigration, 10-1. 

mode of development, 61. 

relations in society, 258. 
Indo-Europeans, 40, 41, 134. 
Industrial art, Arabian, 115. 
Insanity, 46. 

Instinct and intelligence, 243. 
Institutions, political changes of, 59. 
Intellect, national organization of, 248 
Intellectual education, 292. 

freedom, 236. 
Intercommunication, 82. 
Ionians on primary element, 301. 
Irish emigration, 103. 
Italian, modern, 111. 
Italy, its aspirations, 176. 



Jerusalem, 211. 

Jewish physicians, their influence, 

303. 
Jews, color of, 40. 

Hellenizing, 208. 

Messianic idea, 199. 

no art among, 209. 
Journalism, American, 86, 1G7. 

its influence, 94. 
Justinian, wars of, 110. 

wars affect population, 146. 

K. 

Khalifsof the West, 191. 
Killing of land, 84. 



Lakes, great, quantity of water in, 49. 
Language, effects of, 82. 

effects on emigration, 103. 
Lapland witches, 293. 
Lateran Council co .Jemns Averroes, 

197. 
Latin, its use, 82. 
Law, administration of, 288. 

controlling, 22, 34. 

natural operation of, 33, 35. 
Laws of transposition of men, 105. 
Letters misdirected, 36. 
Liberty under restraint, 264. 
Linguistic researches, 134. 
Lisbon earthquake, 187. 
Literature organizes the world, 250. 
Locomotion, consequences of in Asia, 
77. 

effects of, 57, 84, 161. 
Lord's Prayer, 73. 
Lower class obtuse, 161. 

M. 

Macaulay, quotation from, 290. 
Machiavelli's social division, 94. 
Madonna born in Palestine, 114. 
Magellan circumnavigates earth, 89. 
Magianism, 200. 

effect on Jews, 202. 
Magnetic needle, 230. 
Magyars, their emigration, 104. 
Man can not resist change, 79. 

emancipated from agents, 28. 

influenced by climate, 77. 

weight of food of, 15. 
Manchester, introduction of cotton to, 

122. 
Manichoeism, 203. 
Manifest destiny, 265, 312. 
Mariner's compass, variation, 230. 
Material and mental changes, 158. 
Matter and Force, 20. 

indestructibility of, 18. 
Mechanical philosophy, its develop- 
ment, 128. 
Memnon, statue of, 65. 
Men modified by climate, 48, 56. 
Mendicant orders, 195. 
Mental delusion, cause of, 183. 
Meridional track emigration, 144. 
Messianic idea, 207, 210. 



INDEX. 



323 



Meteorology, 216. 
Mexico, its civilization, 97. 
Mexicans used cotton, 116. 
Migration, internal American, 166. 

to the South, 169. 
Mind well balanced, 45. 
Miracles of intelligence, 296. 

Roman, 294. 
Mirror, magical, 241. 
Missionary exertions, 158, 
Mississippi, forcing of mouth of, 297. 

valley population, 176. 
Mohammed, 181. 

illusions of, 182. 

victories of, 112. 
Mohammedan philosophy, 192, 193. 
Mohammedanism, progress of, 188. 
Monogamy produces families, 114. 
Monosyllabic language, 138. • 
Monsoons, cause of, 216. 
Montesquieu, valuation of man, 147. 
Moorish art and science, 116. 
Moors in Spain, 190. 
Moral and intellectual progress, 298. 
Morality, 175. 

Morals, stationary quality of, 291, 299. 
Motion, the value of, 90. 
Mountains, plants upon, 38. 
Mulattoes, their number, 132, 163. 
Multiplicity of worlds, 302. 
Murdoch invents locomotives, 126. 
Museum of Alexandria, 301. 
Muslin, 117. 

N. 

Nasturtium, 39. 

National development, 237. 

homogeneousness, 107. 

intellect organized, 248. 

interior motion, 91. 
Nations, cause of their modification, 
110. 

not isolated forms, 61. 

transitory forms, 11. 
Nature, book of, 238. 

conquest of, 211. 

presses on society, 60. 

unchangeability of, 217. 
Navy, American, 240. 
Nebuchadnezzar, conquest of, 199. 
Negro slavery, 131. 

a fetish worshiper, 138. 



Negro problem in America, 163, 

Nervous system, 244. 

New England, climate of, 51. 

Newspapers, effect of, 86. 

Newton, 127, 303. 

Niagara, Cataract of, 49. 

Nile, its inundations, 66. 

North and South, character of, 53. 

Northern States, races of, 165. 

Notes of music, 218. 

Numerals in various languages, 41. 

O. 

Obelisks, Egyptian, 64. 
Odium theologicum, 237. 
Opinions, action and reaction of, 304. 
Opium eating, 186. 
Order and progress, 58. 
Organic series, 242. 
Organization, intellectual, in China, 
272.. 
of the world, 250. 
Oriental life unchangeable, 76. 
Over-population, its effects, 103. 

P. 

Pacific coast mountains, 49. 

railroad, 91. 

States, emigration to, 91. 

States, policy of, 172. 
Paganism, its destruction in Rome, 311. 
Pali, 134. 
Paper, consumption of, 281. 

invention of, 118. 
Parthenon, 141. 
Patristic philosophy, 224. 
Paul's inventions, 123. 
Peasantry impenetrable to knowledge, 

160. 
Penny post, 284. 
Pentateuch, 204. 
Periodicity, its nature, 23. 
Perpetual motion, 128. 
Persons and particles, relation of, 259 
Peru, its civilization, 97. 
Phantoms, 185. 

Pharisees and Sadducees, 202, 208. 
Philosophy, its advantages, 81. 

systems of change, 310. 
Physical action, its uniformity, 27. 
Plants and animals, relation of, 21. 

condensations from air, 19. 



324 



IXDEX. 



Plants, control of climate over, 28. 

Plato, 263. 

Plotinus, superstition of, 301. 

Plutarch on Eoman marriage, 110. 

Pole star, 66. 

Political differentiation, 254. 

results of machinery, 129. 
Population determined by law, 156. 

laws of, 145. 

resistances, 152. 

slave, 132. 

theory of, 146. 

variations in England, 151. 
Polygamy, effects of, 113. 

in Utah, 173. 
Post-office, 85. 

Poverty, effect of on population, 154. 
Power-loom, 124. 
Prairies, their vegetation, 50. 
Prakrit, 134. 
Preaching, 276. 
Predestined effects, 26. 
Pre-historic researches, 134. 
Press, 281. 
Primitive trace, 246. 
Primogeniture, 98. 
Printers in England, 284. 
Prostitution organized, 155. 
Public and private relations, 261. 

locomotion, necessity of, 86. 

schools in China, 83. 
Puritan emigration, 101. 

E. 

Paces, effect of mingling, 161. 

European, their origin, 145. 

progress of, 157. 
Radcliffe, inventions of, 124. 
Railways, English, 87. 

transference of, 88. 
Rain, 225. 

drops, course of, 17. 

making, 139. 
Rainy days, 52. 
Eeason, authority of, 309. 
Reel, winding on, 37. 
Eeligion, unanimity in, 108. 
Eenovation of the body, 14. 
Republic, origin of, 263. 
Resistance of ideas, 179. 

to population, 153. 
Revelation, two volumes of, 281. 



Revolutionan- impulses unsafe, 59. 
Riots against machinery, 122. 
Roman Church, its mistake, 280. 

empire, 80, 92. 

example to America, 92. 

population, decrease of, 148. 

system, its error, 298. 
Romans, adulteration of, 163. 

disappearance of, 108. 
Rome, Papal, opposes science, 212. 

social corruption of, 109. 
Roof, man living under, 55. 



Saguntum, 99, 

Sandy desert, American, 79. 

Saracens conquer Spain, 189. 

Schools, 273. 

Science, Arabian, 115. 

opposition to, 233. 

organizes the world, 250. 

protection of in America, 235. 
Sea, description of, 219. 

unknown in Central Asia, 41. 
Seasons, their influence, 24. 
Sebastopol, 210. 
Seeds, their origin, 19. 
Self-multiplying social force, 94. 
Shemetic races, no art, 140. 
Silk brought from China, 73. 
Skin of man, 40. 

and skull, changes of, 106. 
Skull, its typical form. 43. 
Sky, 214. 
Slave population, 132. 

states, their political necessities, 312. 

women, 133. 
Slaves, American, their conduct, 133. 

first imported, 131. 
Slavery, Saracen, influence on, 115. 

end of, 297. 
Social divisions, three, 94. 

progress, nature of, 60. 

strata, the lower, 47. 
Society pressed on by Nature, 60. 
Sounds, nature of, 12, 217. 
South, climate of more equable, 52. 
Southern blood-admixture, 169. 

climate, effects on man, 54. 

cross, GG. 

hemisphere, 29. 

States, Whitney's gin, 130. 



INDEX. 



325 



Southern States, races of, 164. " 
Spanish emigration, 96, 

Saracens, 190. 
Spectroscope, 232. 
Spinal cord, 245. 
Sphinxes, 64. 
Spinning, 119. 
Spring, phenomena of, 19. 
Stability, mode of attaining, 250. 

political, 58. 
Stagnant condition of Asia, 70. 
Statesmanship determines population, 

156. 
State sovereignty, 313. 
Steam, nature of, 222. 

engine, 121,222,225. 

political power of, 130. 
Steel, origin of, 73. 
Stereoscope, 232. 

Stevenson perfects locomotive, 127. 
Succession of worlds, 302. 
Sun determines periodicity, 24. 
Superstition, extinction of, 293. 

indigenous, 139. 
Symmetry of brain, 46. 
Syrian idolatry, 199. 

T. 

Tacitus, quotation from, 148. 
Talent, fostering of native, 250. 

given by God, 249. 
Tartars, their emigration, 104. 
Tax on travel impolitic, 86. 
Telegraph, electric, 231. 
Telescope, 232. 
Tempests, cause of, 216. 
Theological odium, 237. 

seminaries, 278. 
Theology organizes the world, 250. 
Thought-degeneration, 111. 

progress of, 306. 
Thread winding on a reel, 37. 
Tornadoes, 216. 
Tournefort on plants, 38. 
Transmigration, 22. 
Transplantation of man, 105. 
Tribal emigration, 104. 
Tribes, effects of their mixture, 106. 
Tropics, plants at, 38. 
Turks, their invasion, 104. 



Type, human, its changes, 56. 
Tyre, colonies of, 99. 

U. 

Unchangeability of institutions, 58. 
United States, climate of, 51. 

description of, 48. 

population, 146, 163. 

total immigration, 103. 
Unity, doctrine of, 143. 

effect of in America, 177. 

of opinion in science, 308. 

of souls, doctrine of, 193. 
Universe, human destiny of, 307. 
Utah, 172. 

V. 
Vaccination, 156. 
Valley, Mississippi, 49. 
Variation, line of no, 231. 
Vermont, 165. 
Virginia cherry, 39. 

planter, 168. 
Voltaic battery, 223, 229. 
Von Bar, law of, 256. 

W. 

War, uses of, 160, 251. 
Water, composition of, 223. 

restoration to the sea, 18. 
Waterfall, its peculiarities, 15. 
Watt's inventions, 124, 151. 
Waves, nature of, 12. 
West, its topography, 50. 
Western emigration, 167. 
Whale, 25. 
Whitney's gin, 130. 
Wind raising, 139. 
Women, exclusion of, 114. 

in Asia and Europe, 113. 

social position of, 270. 
Wonders of science, 232. 
Woolen in England, 121. 
Worship of beasts, 1 62. 
Writing, alphabetical, 219. 
Wyatt's inventions, 123. 

Z. 

Zones of American population, 78. 
of plants, 39. 



THE END. 



c 



6 




Draper's Intelle&tual Development 
of Europe. 

A HISTORY OF THE INTELLECTUAL DEVELOPMENT 

OF EUROPE. Fourth Edition. By John William Draper, 
M.D., LL.D., Profefsor of Chemiftry and Phyfiology in the 
Univerfity of New York, Author cf a "Treatise on Human 
Phyfiology," " Thoughts on American Civil Policy," Text-Books 
on Chemiftry and Natural Philosophy, &c. 8vo, Cloth, $5 00. 

The aim of this book is to show that the Civilization of Europe has not 
proceeded in an arbitrary manner, or by chance, but that it has passed through 
a determinate succession of stages, and has been developed according to nat- 
ural law. 

The author's mode of treating the subject is altogether from a scientific 
point of view, and hence he is led to the consideration of many of those ques- 
tions that have attracted public attention of late years so strongly. In this 
respect, the work presents very great novelty ; yet it is composed in so popular 
a style as to render it suitable not only for persons who delight in philosophical 
reading, but likewise for students of history everywhere. 

In the United States at the present moment its publication can not but be 
acceptable. Though written before our present troubles began, it is full of 
principles and suggestions that every thoughtful reader will connect with the 
great events now transpiring. It also, from the history of the past, in no in- 
distinct manner foreshadows our future. 

Scientific opinions are steadily exercising an ever-increasing power in Mod- 
ern Civilization. They are beginning to modify political institutions. The 
work of Dr. Draper is the first attempt that has been made to describe their 
rise and progress, and how it is that in recent times they have acquired such 
a wonderful influence. A growing want of some authentic exposition of them 
has long been felt among intelligent readers. That want is here supplied, 
with the advantage that ideas too generally serving only to provoke contention 
are presented in a temperate manner, and discussed with a candor that can 
not fail to command respect. 

Extracts from Foreign Critical Notices. 

It is one of the not least remarkable achievements in the progress of the positive philosophy 
that have yet been made in the English tongue. A noble and even magnificent attempt to 
frame an induction from all the recorded phenomena of European, Asiatic, and North African 
history. The strongly human sympathy and solicitude pervading this book is one of its most 
entrancing charms. Unaccustomed though a reader might be to scientific habits of thought, or 
uninterested in the gradual elaboration of eternal rules and principles, here he can at least dis- 
port himself amid noble galleries of historical paintings, and thrill again at the vision of the 
touching epochs that go to form the drama of the mighty European past. This is no dry enu- 
meration of names and dates, no mere catalogue of isolated events and detached pieces of 
heartless mechanism. Rather does this work come to us as a mystic harmony, blending into 



2 Draper's Intellectual Development of Europe. 

one the treasured records of unnumbered histories and biographies, the accumulated stores 
of sciences the most opposed, and erudition the most incongruous, now descending into slow 
and solemn depths of tone, as sin, cruelty, intolerance, form the theme, now again lost in un- 
approachable raptures of sound, as true greatness, endurance, self-control, are reflected in the 
grand turning-points of European story. 

The book of Dr. Draper is eminently encyclopaedic. It ransacks every accredited science, 
all the most recent discoveries, and every independent source of historical information. 

What Comte showed might and ought to be done for the whole world of Man, what Mr. 
Buckle commenced for England, Scotland, France, and Spain, Dr. Draper has effected for the 
whole of Europe. The gigantic vastness of the task is almost paralysing, contained as is the 
result in a very moderate space, but it is done none the less carefully and thoroughly. 

All the latest researches in history, all the most recent discoveries in the realms of geology, 
mechanical science, natural science, and language, every minute particular that can explain 
or illustrate the general progress of all the European races from the most primitive ages, are 
accurately and copiously detailed in their several relations. Nor is the author without such an 
art of representation as can render a book not only such as we ought to read, but also such as 
we like to read. — Westminster Review. 

We proceed now to the agreeable task of giving some slight idea of the merits of this mag- 
nificent woik. It is pre-eminently a practical book. The application of its arguments, its 
erudition, and its proofs to the controversies and the needs of the social state of the present can 
be mistaken by no one. This great theme is well and worthily handled by Draper. To this 
end the efforts of many of the highest minds of the day are converging, effects at once and 
causes of the progress of historical science. Our author thinks that a man must be satisfied if 
only his book lives a little longer than himself. But the great generalizations he propounds will 
not be so speedily surpassed. It is not, therefore, to be wondered at that the highest problems 
of anthropology should be so well handled in the United States. We accept this book as an 
eirnest of what we may expect from the intellectual genius of that nation. — Anthrojjological 
Review. 

This book is the most instructive and complete of all that have been yet written wi.h a 
similar ambition. It is no light commendation to say that its execution is not altogether un- 
equal to its magnitude. If it were equal, the world would place Dr. Draper on one of the 
very highest pinnacles of intellectual achievement. His tenacity and completeness of grasp 
makes itself felt for the most part on every page. It must be admitted that this treatise is one 
of the best attempts to treat the entire history of man on a scientific theory. — Athenceuvi. 

In the special portions of his History Professor Draper displays remarkable industry, vigor, 
and skill. His narration is accurate and graphic, and his grasp of historical truth powerful 
and tenacious. His work has thus a real value as a comprehensive summary of facts, apart 
from the particular theories of philosophy which it is intended to uphold. —Saturday Re- 
view. 

This work must speak for itself; and to those who admire clear and comprehensive details, 
expressed in elegant language, and supported by consecutive arguments, it will be esteemed as 
having completely exhausted the subject it is intended to elucidate. It must take a popular 
no less than a permanent stand — BeWs Weekly Messenger. 

We heartily admire and recommend this book. It is the work of a really original mind, 
and is executed with very great literary skill. The style is excellently adapted to the character 
of the work. And every reader who views the progress of mankind by the powerful cross light 
thrown on it by Dr. Draper will see much that he never saw before, and what he had seen be- 
fore from a new point of view. In conclusion we would say that these volumes must not be 
supposed to be at all heavy reading ; on the contrary, they are very amusing.— Sjiectator. . 

This book is an emphatic testimony to the great truth proclaimed by an older and a better 
book— that while the world by wisdom knows not God, yet it knows that human affairs are gov- 
erned not by chance but by law, and therefore by the Divine will, of which law is the expres- 
sion. — Christian Advocate and Review. 

The history-writing in these volumes is admirably done. Regarded in this light they bear a 
high value. The reader's interest can not but grow as he proceeds, since the style is direct 
and clear, and the thought always of a kind to arouse and repay reflection — London Daily 
News. 

There is enough in the work to engage the attention and command the admiration of the 
reader London Home News. 



Extracts from Critical Notices. 

This is a work of which the brief space now at our command will not enable us to give the 
measure. It covers the entire history of European progress. The author's endeavor is to 
trace the action of primordial law to the general development of the race, and in the suc- 
cessive stages of growth and decline that have marked the collective life of portions of the 
race. To have made the attempt is of itself a great merit and a high achievement. This 
work must take its place as among the most truly original profound, and instructive contribu- 
tions of the age in the department of speculative philosophy — North American Review. 



Draper's Intellectual Development of Europe. 



We count the " History of the Intellectual Development of Europe" one of the .most import- 
ant contributions which has been made for years to the study of the philosophy of history; 
and we have no doubt that while Professor Draper's theory may be disputed by some, the great 
merits of the work and its importance will be acknowledged wherever it is read.— New York 
Evening Post. 

Professor Draper has undertaken a great task, but in our judgment he has wholly and 
worthily accomplished it. . , . ., , , ... 

It is gratifying that, amid all the turmoil and distraction of civil war, such a work as this 
can be safely launched upon the sea of publication. It is, in the strongest meaning of the 
term, a masterly production. All is clear, well defined, perspicuous, and the book will add 
largely to the already well- won fame of the author — Commercial Advertiser. 

It is a powerfully-written and closely-reasoned book, and is entitled to a place with the works 
of Hallam, Guizot, and Buckle.— New York Herald. 

Professor Draper, who is probably one of the most deep thinking and erudite students of 
both physics and metaphysics of the present clay, has in this work accomplished a task which 
no other author of our time has ventured to undertake as a whole, and in a thorough and sys- 
tematic manner. Many have gone over a portion of the ground, and analyzed certain histor- 
ical epochs with reference to their bearing upon intellectual progress and development, but 
these have been merely links in the chain which he has succeeded in completing and connect- 
ing together. 

This is a book which every one should read who aspires to learn not only the facts of history, 
but their moral and application. — Commercial Bulletin. 

This is intended as the completion of the author's very able work on Human Physiology. 
It evinces the same profound and comprehensive views and extensive research. It is present- 
ing a new aspect of humanity, and the idea is conceived with the same ingenuity, and illus- 
trated by a detail of evidence with the industry of Vico and Herder. The Church history of 
Europe is treated in a tone of respect for Christianity, emphatically distinguishing between it 
and ecclesiastical organizations, and therefore entirely Protestant; too consistently so to sat- 
isfy some dogmatists, Protestant as well as Catholic— Christian Register. 

Professor Draper's " Human Physiology" has taken unquestioned rank as one of the most pro- 
found and suggestive works of the age. The object of this was to treat of the development of 
man as an individual. The present work treats of the development of the race. Warbur- 
ton's " Divine Legation" is perhaps the only other book in which such an immense mas3 of learn- 
ing and research is expended in the elucidation and defense of two or three propositions, which 
can be stated in as many scores of words. — American Publisher's Circular and Literary 
Gazette. 

It traverses almost the whole range of literature and science, of human thought and prog- 
ress, for upward of three thousand years ; and this in no superficial way, but in the spirit of 
scientific investigation, and with one object ever in view. 

Aside from its main scope, there are particular sections of this book which are of great value 
to the non-scientific reader. If one would study the progress of the sciences in their relation 
to humanity, not even WhewelPs History of the Inductive Sciences will be so helpful to him as 
Dr. Draper's Chapters on Astronomy, the History of the Earth, Animal Life, the Organic Se- 
ries, &c. — Congregationalist. 

Scholars will be greatly interested in this book; and though they may dissent from the 
theory, will acknowledge the author's industry and ability, and admire the perspicuity of its 
style and the vigor of its thought. — ZionHs Herald. 

The very valuable and interesting work of Prof. Draper frankly accepts the doctrine that the 
development both of animal and intellectual life depends on physical conditions, and asserts 
this position with a fertility of argument and a wealth of illustration which give it a com- 
manding rank among similar treatises. We can not call to mind an author who has stated 
it with equal force, or shown himself so thoroughly master of that variety of scientific proof 
which was needed to fortify it. There is at once a freedom of handling, and a clear, earnest, 
reverent tone in the discussion. The general sketch in the beginning of those physical condi- 
tions which have shaped the historic life of Europe is unsurpassed in clearness of outline and 
comprehensive vigor of grasp. And the closing portion, which contains the scientific analogies 
that justify his leading position — that the true doctrine of history or ethnology must be found- 
ed on Physiology— has the independent force and value of an original argument. 

The same vigorous independence of thought and facile wealth of illustration appear id the 
treatment of historical periods, especially in the advance of philosophy and science. Massive 
generalization, with a command of detail that gives vitality and interest to all the parts — the 
magnetizing of facts by a powerful current of thought, is the highest quality that can be de- 
manded in a work of this kind, and they are found to a rare and high degree in this pres- 
ent treatise. We should point to it sooner than to any other we could name, to do the im- 
portant service of crystallizing in the mind of a thoughtful person the loose aggregate of facts 
gathered up in the course of much desultory reading before the age of twenty-five. And the 
rather, because its independent and courageous temper is not marred, so far as we can observe, 
by any irreverence or undue defiance of tone Christian Examiner. 



4 Draper's Intellectual Development of Europe. 

In a merely passing notice we can not expect to do justice to a work of such magnitude ; 
enough to note its leading idea, to sketch its plan, and cordially to commend it as rich in in- 
struction and powerful in thought. 

No reader, whether satisfied or doubtful of the soundness of this theory, can fail to be im- 
pressed by the comprehensive knowledge and intellectual vigor with which it is set forth.— 
A'. Y. Albion. 

The work supplies a vacuum not before filled. Whewell's History of Science is the nearest 
approach to it, but is too narrow, by reason of its technical character, to have met the demand. 
The author has succeeded to a very remarkable extent in giving interest, and even vivacity 
and picturesqueness, to that dryest of all historical presentments, a condensed statement cov- 
ering large and disconnected tracts of time.— Lutheran Observer. 

This work is properly the complement to Dr. Draper's "Human Physiology." In that work 
man was considered as an individual, whose growth and decline are governed by fixed and 
invariable laws. In this he is considered in his social relations as a component part of a 
nation or people. The proposition which Dr. Draper undertakes to demonstrate is, " that so- 
cial advancement is as completely under the control of law as is bodily growth : the life of 
an individual is a miniature of the life of a nation." To demonstrate the majesty of Law in the 
history of nations, the author brings an accumulation of learning and a wealth of illustration 
for which we know of only two parallels — Warburton's "Divine Legation of Moses" and 
Buckle's " History of Civilization." Dr. Warburton's immense learning was exhausted in 
maintaining a proposition which nobody denied, with little bearing upon the disputable one, 
which was essential to the validity of his argument, while Buckle was oppressed by the very 
weight of his illustrative examples. Dr. Draper moves with ease and vigor under the weight 
of his mighty panoply. He undertakes to give the history of the development of Europe, 
almost contemptuously ignoring the petty struggles of kings and emperors, touching upon them 
only when they are exponents of thoughts and ideas. The grand conclusions are, that "the 
organization of public intellect is the end toward which European Civilization is tending;" 
that "Europe is now entering on its mature phase of national life;" and that, "in an all-im- 
portant particular, the prospect of Europe is bright. China is passing the last stage of civil 
life in the cheerlessness of Buddhism ; Europe approaches it through Christianity." We are 
confident that this volume will be recognized as the great philosophical work of the age. — 
Harper's Magazine. 

Among the contributions to philosophic thought that have appeared within the last few 
years, few present stronger claims upon the attention of intelligent students than the present 
Work. The title opens at once the most imposing problems that can engage the human mind 
— the progress of man — the conditions of his unfolding — the forces which impel it, and the ob- 
stacles which impede it — the course and method of human evolution— these are the grave 
questions discussed in this original and elaborate volume. 

The exposition of the influence of the Arabs and Jews upon the intellectual development 
of Europe, of the Italian system of civil and church polity in the European age of Faith, and 
of the rise of independent inquiry ; the struggle of advancing opinions with ecclesiasticism, 
the origin of sciences, the extension of human knowledge and the consequent gradual regenera- 
tion of society which characterized the European age of HeasoH — these form contributions to 
the history of intellectual progress alike remarkable in wealth of erudition and comprehensive 
vigor of statement. The peculiar claims of Professor Draper's work to an eminent place among 
historic compositions are chiefly those Avhich arise from his view of the subject as a man of 
science. At once and without hesitation he lays down the broad principle that the develop- 
ment both of animal and intellectual life depends on physical conditions, and he has fortified 
this position with a power of reasoning and a copiousness of illustration which have made the 
argument peculiarly his own. His work introduces more of nature into history than any of its 
predt cessors. Rising to the clear and steady conception of a comprehensive immutable order 
in nature, he regards the development of the human mind as but part of that order, to be in- 
terpreted only in connection with the all-pervading scheme. It is written in a singularly 
clear and attractive style, often rising into a vivid eloquence. Indeed there runs through it 
a vein of genuine poetry which shows that the cultivation of exact science is not necessarily 
hostile to imagination and a deep sense of beauty. — N. Y. Tribune. 



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INCOMPARABLY THE BEST WORK ON THE SUBJECT." 



Drapers Physiology. 

HUMAN PHYSIOLOGY, STATICAL AND DYNAMICAL; 

or, The Conditions and Course of the Life of Man : Being the 
Text of the Lectures delivered in the Medical Department of the 
University. By John William Draper, M.D., LL.D., Profefsor 
of Chemiftry and Phyiiology in the University of New York ; 
Author of "Thoughts on the Future Civil Policy of America," 
"A Hiftory of the Intellectual Development of Europe," Text- 
Books on Chemiftry and Natural Philosophy, &c. Uluftrated by 
nearly 300 Fine Woodcuts from Photographs. 8vo, 650 pages, 
Cloth, $5 00; Sheep, $5 50. 

The favorable reception which has been given to this work by the Public 
and the Medical Profession, both in America and Europe, piwes how com- 
pletely it has accomplished its object of bringing the science on which it treats 
to the comprehension of the general reader without any sacrifice of its high 
scientific position. As a representation of the present state of Physiology, 
embodying all the recent foreign discoveries in a form not otherwise accessible 
to the student, it has been adopted as a text-book in a majority of American 
Colleges. 

Great, however, as its success in that respect has been, the favor extended 
to it by the reading and educated classes generally is still more striking. They 
have appreciated the manner in which it brings knowledge on a subject of the 
highest importance to the well-being of society to the easy comprehension of 
persons not familiar with medical matters. They have found it to be a book 
not alone adapted to the University or College, but suited to the instruction 
of every head of a family. The numerous photographic engravings it con- 
tains tend greatly to a clear illustration of the various topics it discusses, en- 
abling those who have only the opportunity of casual study to follow the Au- 
thor in his descriptions without any difficulty. 

Of all the sciences, none comes more closely home to us than Physiology. 
It explains to us how "fearfully and wonderfully we are made," teaches us 
how the various parts of our system act in a state of health, and enables us 
to understand the causes of our ailments and diseases. There is no class of 
society, and, indeed, no individual, who may not profitably become acquainted 
with it. It is, therefore, to the general reader, as well as the profession, that 
this book is offered. 



Drapers Physiology. 



A book that is full of interest, containing many striking views and novel experimental illus- 
trations. We make our sincere acknowledgments to the author for the fresh contributions he 
has furnished to our knowledge of the laws of life, and the new impulse he has imparted to the 
study of its mysteries. It is full and thorough beyond all previous treatises that we have seen. 
As to descriptive detail and the entire theory of organization, it comprehends the latest dis- 
coveries and embodies the latest conclusions of science. — North American Review. 

It is an original and interesting work, rich in experiment, fertile in suggestion, and scholar- 
like in composition. — Boston Meaical and Surgical Journal. 

We rise from the survey of this work with an impression of its great power and value. We are 
satisfied that Draper's Physiology will take an important place at once, and will add one more 
to the number of American text-books which may be placed side by side with the best of those 
obtained from abroad. — Philadelphia Medical Examiner. 

Dr. Draper's Physiology is perhaps the greatest work ever issued from the American press. 
It ranks with the kindred (German) work of Lehman, but is much more readable and plain. 
The reading and studying of it is worth the reading and studying all the medical practices of 
the last quarter of a century St. Louis Medical and Surgical Journ.il. 

Written in an easy, fluent style, it is a work that deserves to be in the library of eveiy 
student.— London Athenaeum. 

A profound and comprehensive treatise of man's physical life through all its changes — a work 
highly honorable to himself and his profession — London Eclectic Review. 

This work has all the graphic distinctness of oral teaching London Economist. 

As a book for occasional reference it will be prized by eveiy well-informed person.— London 
Standard. 

Its arrangement is origina 1 , and in its width of view it stands first of our physiological 
treatises.— London Medical Times and Gazette. 

Probably the best work of the kind before the public Christian Chronicle (Philadelphia). 

Compact and lucid, it embraces an immense amount of most interesting and valuable matter. 
— Coigregationalist. 

The great amount of information logically arranged and clearly stated in this comprehensive 
yet compact work renders it pre-eminently fit to be adopted as a text-book in all institutions 
of learning in which Physiology forms pait of a course of instruction, and general readers will 
find it the most interesting and useful compendium of the science for private study. — JS'ew York 
Commercial Advertiser: 

It constitutes an admirable book for students while in attendance on lectures ; at the same 
time it will be found well adapted to the general student, who is without an oral teacher, and 
yet is seeking to know and understand the physical laws of his being. — American Medical 
Gazette. 

Far above elementary works in scope and character, it seems fitted to secure a wide circula- 
tion. — London Examiner. 

It would do excellent service as a text -book in schools and colleges, and is a valuable contri- 
bution to eveiy library in the country. — Sew York Chronicle. 

It is the largest and most complete treatise on Physiology ever published in our country, and 
will be received and honored as a standard of high authority in colleges and academies, and 
among professional men. — Philadelphia Christian Observer. 

A complete exposition of the science in its present state, embracing the latest views publish- 
ed in France, England, and Germany, adapted to professional and non-professional readers.— 
Hartford Religious Herald. 

Beyond question the best presentation of this great subject accessible to the mass of Amer- 
ican "students Richmoml Central Presbyterian. 

We should be sorry to see its knowledge confined to the collegiate class, when a diffusion of 
more accurate physiological knowledge, even among our educated classes is exceedingly de- 
sirable Protestant Churchman. 

The Pupils of our public and private schools, who have been well drilled in the school phys- 
iologies, will take great interest in pursuing the subject in this more extended treatise.— Mem- 
phis Medical Recorder. 

It can not fail to be useful to the physician and student, and deserves a place in colleges and 
libraries.— Lutheran Observer. 

To the scholar it will exhibit the progress of the physical sciences in connection with the 
human organization. To all it will convey, in a readable form, the doctrines and facts of 
physiology.— Lancaster Independent Whig. 

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PALGRAVE'S ARABIA. Narrative of a Year's Journey through 
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